REVIEW: Django Unchained

Django Unchained (2012): Written and directed by Quentin Tarantino. Starring: Jamie Foxx, Christoph Waltz, Leonardo DiCaprio, Kerry Washington and Samuel L. Jackson. Rated R (All the blood and racial epithets you'd expect of the antebellum South and then some). Running time: 165 minutes.

2 stars (out of four)

The genius of Quentin Tarantino has always been his ability to pull off scenes that should never work. Take for example Kill Bill, that sprawling two-part tribute to his favorite exploitation flicks and a one-stop deposit for all his craziest ideas. In Kill Bill, he drags his characters through one extravagant set piece after another and indulges in all sorts of ludicrous action. Yet somehow, miraculously, he makes them feel human. He convinces us they are worth rooting for and we actually feel invested in his lunacy.

Watching his work in recent years – both Kill Bill films, Inglourious Basterds, and now his latest, Django Unchained – has often felt like watching a man juggling live sticks of dynamite. At any moment, it seems, he could trip and the whole thing would go kablooey right in his face. To top it off, his style is wildly brash and self-assured, as though he never doubted anything less than the complete and total success of his manic creations.

His most recent creation is a rescue-the-girl western set in the Old South two years before the Civil War. A slave named Django (played with grim, one-note determination by Jamie Foxx) is trudging through the Texas wilderness on a chain gang when a traveling German dentist appears out of the darkness. Dr. King Schultz (a delightful Christoph Waltz) introduces himself to the two slave traders escorting the chain gang.

Like so many Tarantino characters, Schultz has a large vocabulary and a flair for theatricality. He dances around the subject a while but eventually makes his intentions clear. He is going to buy Django from them whether they agree to it or not. This opening scene, cheerfully overwritten and crackling with tension, is a thrill. Quentin Tarantino neatly lays out the stakes and has fun letting the situation slowly play out.

Django and Schultz soon ride off in a carriage that has a large white tooth on its roof bouncing on a spring (a wonderfully goofy and inspired sight gag that, judging by how often we see it in the film’s first act, Mr. Tarantino is clearly very proud of). We learn that Schultz is not a dentist but a bounty hunter. He needs Django to identify a trio of wanted men who previously worked on a plantation where Django was once a resident.

What follows is a series of amusing, if needlessly drawn-out, episodes that feature Don Johnson as a mustachioed plantation owner and Jonah Hill as Ku Klux Klan leader. There are some good nyuks had over the Klan’s homemade white hoods but this leg of the movie doesn’t quite have that Tarantino magic and the movie plods along for a while until it finds its real story.

Django wants to rescue his wife (Kerry Washington), who is currently a house slave for the wealthy and debonair Calvin Candie (Leonardo DiCaprio having a lot of fun with a Southern accent). Candie runs a profitable business pitting slaves against each other in fight-to-the-death matches at his manor – named Candyland (nyuk, nyuk) – so Django and Schultz devise a plan to dupe Candie into selling them Django’s wife by posing as slave traders interested in buying one of his prize fighters.

Django Unchained is on more sure footing in the scenes at Candyland, largely thanks to Mr. DiCaprio’s effortless charm and a fine turn by Samuel L. Jackson (under some fantastic old man makeup) as Stephen, Candie’s head slave. Stephen, it turns out, is actually the most interesting character in the film and the whole third act turns on the keen observations of this loyal family servant.

Quentin Tarantino is a master at crafting plots that gradually build in tension and complexity, and for a while Django Unchained seems poised for some last unexpected turn to resolve Django and Schultz’s crafty bait-and-switch scheme. But instead, Mr. Tarantino opts for a lazier ending. In the final half-hour, the movie devolves into a gratuitous and numbingly uninventive bloodbath that cheapens everything that came before it.

Quentin Tarantino, usually such a smart writer, embraces all his worst impulses here. The violence is bloody and over-the-top but the final product resembles something a Tarantino imitator might have churned out – stylized and violent but devoid of anything thematically substantial.

The cast is also noticeably lacking in female roles. Sure, the worlds of Mr. Tarantino’s characters are typically male-dominated but he is usually good about writing at least a few strong women into his films. Kerry Washington, however, is relegated to playing the weeping damsel in distress and the other women in the film are little more than pretty faces.

And while no one expected this film to be racially sensitive, there is no doubt that a major point of contention for many will be Mr. Tarantino’s overuse of a particular racial slur. Granted, the movie’s historical context does allow him to use the word but it gets tossed around so frequently and with such relish, it’s distracting. It is easily the most said word in the film, which reduces the impact it might have had if uttered less often.

There are moments when Django Unchained clicks and might have held up as a solid, if not classic, Tarantino film. Mr. Tarantino’s comedic timing is still sharp and his love of dialogue is as apparent as ever. But the ending is such a disappointment it nearly ruins the whole movie. Though it pains me to say it, for the first time, Quentin Tarantino drops the dynamite and blows himself up.

- Steve Avigliano, 1/5/13

REVIEW: Machete

Machete (2010): Directed by Robert Rodriguez and Ethan Maniquis. Written by Robert Roderiguez and Alvaro Rodriguez. Starring Danny Trejo, Steven Seagal, Michelle Roderiguez, Jeff Fahey, Cheech Marin, Lindsay Lohan, Don Johnston, Jessica Alba and Robert DeNiro. Rated R (strong bloody violence throughout, language, some sexual content and nudity). Running time: 105 minutes.

3 ½ stars (out of four)

When the exploitation throwback double-feature Grindhouse came out in 2007, you got the sense that co-directors Robert Rodriguez and Quentin Tarantino were making the movie for themselves. They had seen countless schlocky B-grade and lower horror and action flicks in their youth and they longed for a day when such films could be appreciated again and maybe even return to cinemas. The final result was an over three-hour trip down their own memory lane, complete with fake trailers for upcoming releases that didn’t exist. The highlight of those faux-trailers was Machete, the story of a Mexican vigilante (Danny Trejo) with a penchant for the titular weapon.

Now Robert Rodriguez, along with his co-director Ethan Maniquis, have made that movie, even going so far as to insert most of the footage from the original trailer into the feature-length version. While Grindhouse had occasional moments of brilliance, it was also a good deal self-indulgent, but Machete doesn’t have that problem, partly because its allowed to exist on its own, free from the earlier gimmick and the double-feature running time. Machete commits to its exploitation roots more than either of those earlier Grindhouse features, and is more fun then them too.

Much of the film’s success rests with Danny Trejo as the title character. His performance is so commanding, it was already a classic three years ago in that first trailer. He’s the kind of unstoppable action hero where all questions (“How did he do that?” “How will he survive this one?” “Why does every woman want to sleep with him?”) are answered the same way: Because he’s Machete, duh. Trejo, who might have less lines of dialogue than most of the supporting characters, stomps around the film stone-faced, blade in hand. His mustache is curved in such a way as to give him the look of wearing a perpetual frown, and his face is riddled with scars from a lifetime of fighting. Trejo is so comfortable onscreen, it’s as though this is his fifth Machete feature.

In the full-length movie, Robert Rodriguez and his co-writer and cousin Álvaro Rodriguez give Machete a political agenda too. After losing his wife and daughter at the hands of the drug kingpin Torrez (Steven Seagal), Machete becomes a day laborer along the Texas/Mexico border where deportation is a constant threat for workers. There he befriends Luz (Michelle Rodriguez) who owns a popular taco truck and might just be the mysterious Latino vigilante, Shé (the accent is added over the ‘e’ for an extra nudge and a wink). Shé is said to have helped countless immigrants cross the border and so Luz’s taco truck is under the close watch of Sartana (Jessica Alba), an immigration officer looking to shut down the covert operation.

Looming large over them all is Senator John McLaughlin (Robert De Niro) who is running for reelection under a campaign that highlights a staunch opposition to immigrant rights. He wants to kick everyone out of the state who doesn’t speak English and build an electric fence along the border. Machete, meanwhile, is recruited by a man named Michael Booth (Jeff Fahey), a man who wears a nice suit, drives a limo and has some money to throw around. He wants Machete to assassinate the Senator. Of course, nothing is as simple as it seems and Machete quickly finds himself at the center of a larger conspiracy, one that may even go back to his old nemesis, Torrez.

While Trejo gets most of the glory here, Machete is populated with rich supporting characters. The indispensable Jeff Fahey is utterly convincing even in the film’s most absurd moments and Michelle Rodriguez is a lot of fun to watch in the gun-toting, skin-showing badass chick role. Alba, who has never been much of an actress, is perfectly suited to a role that requires her to look amazing at all times and occasionally scrunch her face when she’s working things out. De Niro’s character starts as an extended cameo and soon becomes a game to see how many ridiculous things the film make can the legendary actor do (a lot, is the answer). Steven Seagal camps it up as the archenemy and gets some deserved laughs, Lindsay Lohan shows up as the promiscuous daughter of Booth, Don Johnston is a militaristic border cop, and Cheech Marin reprises his role from the trailer as the priest who owns a pair of shotguns. 

Machete falls under the neo-exploitation genre that started with Grindhouse and here Rodriguez gives us another nostalgic tribute to a kind of movie that maybe never quite existed in the first place, at least not as he remembers it. No exploitation flick could have ever delivered the consistent entertainment offered here and so Machete functions as an action parody while remaining its own beast. This is a gleefully silly movie crafted for a niche audience and it succeeds in its goals, even compared to Grindhouse. The violence is excessive and wildly inventive, characters talk in corny exposition and cornier one-liners, and the editing has a deliberate sloppiness in certain scenes. The film plays everything for a laugh and yet somehow manages to deliver better action scenes than most major blockbusters even in its goofiest moments.

Near the end of the film, there’s an ingenious scene where a group of armed henchmen get together and discuss their thankless jobs. They’ve all been beaten, shot or stabbed by Machete and they wonder if it’s really worth it. “I’ve been watching the boss,” one says, “And to be honest, he seems like a schmuck.” It’s a conversation moviegoers have been waiting for years for nameless henchmen to have. Action aficionados and movie buffs alike have always wanted a movie like this, whether they knew it or not – one that recognizes its absurdity and only revels in its slashings and explosions all the more. Robert Rodriguez offers Machete like a present to those anticipating fans. He’s rewriting film history and giving exploitation flicks a better name than they ever could have made for themselves.

- Steve Avigliano, 9/3/10

BEST OF THE DECADE - #10: Kill Bill Vol. 1 & 2

Kill Bill Vol. 1 & 2 (2003-2004): Written and Directed by Quentin Tarantino. Starring: Uma Thurman, David Carradine, Daryl Hannah, Michael Madsen, Lucy Liu, Vivica A. Fox. Rated R. Running time: 111 min. (Vol. 1), 136 min. (Vol. 2).

Quentin Tarantino was a critic’s darling in the early 90’s after Reservoir Dogs and Pulp Fiction elevated the gangster genre with smart writing and tight filmmaking. His underrated 1997 effort Jackie Brown disappointed some fans, but the maturity and focus of that film kept him within the good graces of critics. In 2003, however, the director found himself facing considerable backlash with the release of Kill Bill Vol. 1. Some of these criticisms came from Tarantino’s usual detractors, but perhaps just as many came from those who admired his previous works. The arguments made about his other films seemed doubly true here – he steals from other films, revels in violence, and self-indulgently over-stylizes. Kill Bill is a deliberate tribute to the director’s favorite movies – that forgotten back catalogue of exploitation flicks, kung fu and spaghetti westerns collecting dust in your local video store – in an effort to highlight the best of these films and maybe even get us to rent one (although these days even your local video store is becoming an antique). Tarantino makes no effort to hide what he’s doing. Every trick he pulls is out in the open, bringing attention to itself. Call it self-indulgent, call it meta-cinema; regardless, it works. The Kill Bill films are stylized candy – they have little pretense of being much more than that – but oh, what gourmet candy they are.

Despite the impressive style of the Kill Bill films, many critics lamented a loss of Tarantino’s storytelling skills that were so treasured before. In place of his witty, colorful dialogue are intentionally cheesy one-liners and stilted conversations about revenge and “unfinished business.” However, evocation of the aforementioned B-movies aside, the dialogue here retains a Tarantino-ian air in its crispness and clarity. Despite his reputation, Tarantino is a remarkably patient filmmaker. His characters don’t just kill each other – they talk about it first. The script borrows much of the hamminess of B-movies, but Tarantino infuses it with humor, pop culture jokes and self-awareness. At one point Uma Thurman’s voiceover introduces us to a character as the woman “dressed like she’s a villain on Star Trek.” But isn’t Tarantino the one who dressed her? The film pokes fun at its own style and never takes itself too seriously. Take a scene from Vol. 2, for example, where Bill and Budd discuss the Bride’s bloody fight with a gang of kung-fu warriors known as the Crazy 88. Budd wonders how she could have cut through all 88 of them. Bill responds that “there weren’t really 88 of them, they just call themselves the Crazy 88.” “How come?” Budd asks. “I don’t know,” Bill shrugs, “I guess they thought it sounded cool.” Tarantino is enamored with these cool films, but he also parodies them and understands that it’s all for the sake of fun.

Though these are not films to be taken seriously, Tarantino scores some genuinely touching moments at the end of Vol. 2 when Uma Thurman discovers that her 4-year-old daughter is alive and living with her father, Bill. Here Tarantino drops much of the imitation and writes some of his best dialogue, including a child’s understanding of life and death, and an insightful analysis of Superman. He digs underneath the seemingly shallow action that precedes these moments and reveals actual characters with convincing motivations. Of course, they still exist in Movie Land, but Tarantino finds the heart of cinema’s artificiality in a way that few filmmakers do. In one scene, Thurman talks a female assassin out of killing her by showing the woman a positive pregnancy test she took moments before the assassin arrived to kill her. The scene, both tense and funny, is not borrowed from anywhere, but is wholly Tarantino.

Many have stated that the films, particularly Vol. 1, are all style and no substance. But since when is style not substantial? Problems arise in highly stylized films only when the director does not know how to handle these stylistic devices. The Kill Bill films are filled with such tricks, featuring several scenes in black-and-white, one shot in a 4:3 aspect ratio, another entirely in anime, superimposed text, split screen, etc. And these are only the post-production additions. Tarantino uses the camera in bold ways, such as an extended tracking shot through a Japanese restaurant and surprising angles that defamiliarize otherwise typical fight scenes. You could call him reckless if every shot wasn’t so carefully put together. The soundtrack makes up another essential aspect of the film’s style. Tarantino showcases his usual knack for unearthing lost musical gems, adding here Ennio Morricone themes, funky selections from kung fu scores and original music (a rarity for Tarantino) by the RZA and Robert Rodriguez.

Is he showing off? Yes, but it’s hard to complain when a director has this level of proficiency and knowledge of film. Tarantino is as familiar with the style of French New Wave as he is Blaxploitation, and he throws everything together as if the boundaries of time and geography are merely illusory – which they are. Though the films do not expressly preach, there is an argument to be found here, one that is familiar to anyone who has ever tried to defend a film for its entertainment value alone. The Kill Bill films are sophisticated executions of trashy genres, blurring the line between high and low culture until the line is no longer visible. All filmmakers borrow from those who came before them. Such is the nature of art. By making his influences explicit and revealing his process, he celebrates the craft of film – old and new, high and low, all together.

Kill Bill, as one cohesive project, is more focused than it first appears. Tarantino takes the time to build his own mythology and flesh out the history of his characters. The film was divided into two releases due to length, and Tarantino makes the division work (there is a clear tonal shift between Vol. 1 and 2). On DVD, however, you can kick back and watch it all at once, letting the style of this self-proclaimed “gory story” wash over you. Stylized candy it may be, but if I’m going to rot my teeth out – and I most assuredly will – I want it to be at the hands of the finest confectioner in the world.

- Steve Avigliano, 2/1/10

REVIEW: Inglourious Basterds

Inglourious Basterds (2009): Written & Directed by Quentin Tarantino. Starring Brad Pitt, Mélanie Laurent, Christoph Waltz, Michael Fassbender, Eli Roth, Diane Kruger, Daniel Brühl, Til Schweiger. Rated R (strong graphic violence, language and brief sexuality). Running time: 153 minutes.

4 stars (out of four)

Just two years ago, it seemed as though Quentin Tarantino, in his second decade of filmmaking, had resigned to reviving forgotten cult movie genres. The Kill Bill films, while brilliant in their own respect, emphasize style as much as they do plot, and are essentially pastiches of the many B-movies Tarantino has assimilated through a lifetime of movie watching. Death Proof, his contribution to the exploitation throwback Grindhouse, is trashy fun with a feminist bent, but its ultimate goal is still emulation. There was even talk of him making a kung-fu film to be shot entirely in Mandarin that never came to fruition. Inglourious Basterds too bares the director’s love of movies, but it also allows Tarantino to return to what he truly does best: storytelling.

At first it seems as if Inglourious Basterds is going to follow in Pulp Fiction’s narrative footsteps; the film is divided into chapters that initially seem disconnected. Basterds however, offers a more linear narrative and its structure is not so much episodic as it is patient. Not until the fourth chapter of five does Tarantino begin to pull the separate threads together. By the time we reach the final chapter and all the main players are gathered in one room together, the payoff is even bigger after such a gradual build. Tarantino resists intercutting the storylines, allowing scenes the time to build on their own terms, and giving each scene a greater dramatic impact. Without cutting away to another scene, there is no break in tension and we get to watch a scene slowly simmer before it boils over.

The opening scene is an excellent example this, setting the film’s pace with a long dialogue scene between high-ranking Nazi Hans Landa (Christoph Waltz) and a French farmer (Denis Menochet). The dialogue here crackles with tension as Landa takes his time with pleasantries before getting down to business. Also impressive is how this scene, as well as many others in the film, is not only dialogue-driven, but primarily subtitled. As it was in Nazi-occupied France, characters move between French, German and English depending on the setting and company. As the scene gradually unravels, we learn the purpose of Landa’s visit to the farm: to learn the whereabouts of a Jewish family that has been eluding the SS for months. Christoph Waltz, a relatively unknown Austrian TV actor, commands attention from his first moments onscreen, remaining calm throughout his investigation and relishing the tense silence. There is an immediate understanding that this is an intelligent man very good at his job, and his performance retains this foreboding presence throughout the film.

After an impressive opener, the film introduces the Basterds, a rogue troop of Jewish-American soldiers led by Aldo Raine (Brad Pitt brandishing a Southern accent and some fine comedic timing) whose goal is to instill fear in the Nazis by brutally killing every German soldier they come across. Oh yeah, and scalping them too. The Basterds’ storyline is the stylistic heart of the movie, indulging in flashbacks, montages and even a brief narration by Samuel L. Jackson. Though Tarantino pulls out all his best tricks here, the stylization never eclipses the scenes’ intent. He has great fun with the Basterds but never overdoes anything. As for the scalping, it’s all part of Tarantino’s endless cinematic invention. His characters exist in a self-aware movie world where such things are just a fact of war.

Finally, the movie introduces us to the other major player, French cinema-owner Shosanna Dreyfus, and Tarantino’s requisite strong female character (there’s actually two in this movie). Dreyfus is hiding her Jewish heritage under an alias, but after earning the affection of German soldier Frederick Zoller (Daniel Brühl, Good Bye Lenin!), she finds herself in a unique position both dangerous and influential. The details of what happens next need not be discussed here. The fun of Inglourious Basterds is the way it unspools in surprising directions and weaves its characters’ paths together.

This being a Tarantino film, Inglourious Basterds features great music, albeit less prominently featured than in the director’s previous movies. The soundtrack is often submerged in the background, comprised largely of scores from spaghetti westerns, with the exception of a well-placed Bowie song. It’s all part of Tarantino’s restraint as a director, keeping the focus on a given scene’s action.

Those expecting a historical depiction of WWII should be warned: the war is used only as a backdrop for Tarantino’s story. He is much more interested in the culture-clash dynamics that result when one country occupies another than he is in combat action, and while the film has its share of violent moments, none occur on the battlefield. Tarantino uses history to tell his story rather than the other way around and to say that he takes a liberty or two with historical accuracy is an exercise in understatement. This is a revenge story uninterested in creating a sympathetic view of the Nazis and it plays by its own rules.

Inglourious Basterds combines the inventive stylization and offbeat humor of Pulp Fiction with the maturity and restraint of Tarantino’s underrated Jackie Brown, while also adding a newfound sense of ambition that allows the film to reach heights previously unseen by the director. If this isn’t Tarantino’s best film, it easily stands alongside his best, and he knows it too. He all but calls the film his masterpiece twice, but when a director’s self-assuredness works this well, his cockiness only adds to the film’s charm.

- Steve Avigliano, 9/1/09