The last time I reviewed a Tarantino film it was near enough 4 pages long and guess what, so is my review of Django Unchained, a film that pays homage to the western genre and it's Italian cousin, the Spaghetti western. It's a tale of revenge set two years before the Civil war and it's great fun if a bit flawed. Check out my review after the jump...this review does contain SPOILERS
Let
me just start by stating that anyone expecting a remake of the Sergio
Corbucci classic Spaghetti western, Django (1966), will be pleasantly
surprised by what Tarantino has done with this film. I know this is
going to confuse some people much like Inglourious Basterds did when
everyone thought QT had remade Enzo Castalleri's 1978 Warsploitation
classic. But Django Unchained only takes the name of the character
Django and like IB he crafts a completely new and original tale. Some
one on IMDB stated that Kill Bill was about Female revenge movies, IB
was about war movies and Django Unchained is a spaghetti western that
isn't about spaghetti westerns which is what harms it. What this
individual seemed to forget is that in 1858 there are no movies so
characters can't make a reference to Django or Death Rides A Horse
(1967) but the references are in the look of the film, certain shots,
setting and actions that the characters do. At one point the film
references another Corbucci western, The Great Silence (1968) by
having them trek through snow, now anyone not familiar with that film
may not notice the connection or the fact that Django and Broomhilda
may very well be the great great grandparents of John Shaft (from the
movie Shaft) due to Broomhilda's surname, Von Shaft. But if you enter
Django Unchained as just casual film viewer you will enjoy the film
regardless of whether you get the subtle references or not.
The
plot follows Dr. King Schultz, a former dentist turned bounty hunter
who free's Django from a couple of slave traders and enlists him to
help him track down a gang of brothers known as the Brittle Bros as
Django was previously in their possession along with his wife
Broomhilda. Schultz proposes that Django join him and that once the
men are caught either dead or alive, he will help Django track and
rescue his wife from the man who currently owns her. This leads them
into the presence of Calvin Candie, a relatively young plantation
owner who lives in a large house at Candieland. Django and Schultz
use the cover story of them buying a Mandigo fighter to locate
Broomhilda and rescue her. Stephen, Candie's house slave, smells
something fishy about the two men and realises that Django and
Broomhilda know each other. This leads to a showdown between Schultz
and Candie which ends with each man dead. Django is captured and sent
to a mining colony but on the way coerces the dumb men taking him to
release him because he can take them to a large sum of cash. In a
flash the three men are dead and Django escapes. He heads back to
Candieland where the slaves and Calvin's sister are returning from
burying Calvin. As they enter the house, Django is waiting for them
and proceeds to kill every mother fucker in the room and ends up
blowing the house up and escaping with Broomhilda to a life of
freedom.
That
was the easiest way I could explain the plot without going into three
pages of description. So much more happens in the film than what i've
just described above. There is an entire scene set on a different
plantation where they do find the Brittle Bros which is followed by a
scene in which a group of hooded men on horses carrying torches
attempt to kill Django and Schultz, however this scene didn't really
need any inclusion in the film, it didn't take the plot anywhere and
it's never referenced again. My biggest problem with this scene is
that Tarantino felt the need to add a Blazing Saddles type joke about
how the holes are too small in the hoods and that they can't see
anything. It didn't need to be in the film and like I said it never
really goes anywhere and never referenced again. The ploting has some
slight problems but it's an overlookable problem because once you
notice it something happens and you're back on track. Django
Unchained runs at around 165 minutes and to be fair those minutes do
go by pretty fast but it could have been shorter by about 25 minutes.
The Dark Knight Rises is the same length and that also flies by quite
fast but with that film you notice so much is going on that it's not
a major problem. I think at the hands of Sally Menke, guiding
Tarantino, it could have been a much more streamlined film and
probably shorter too, but obviously due to Menke's untimely death,
the editing passed onto Fred Raskin, who had previously edited the
last 3 Fast and Furious movies so some of the editing is a little too
kinetic and looses that whole Tarantino long take style that Menke
did so well.
Performances
wise, there's not a single dud performance in the entire film. When
Jamie Foxx was announced as Django, the internet was full of hate for
him, but the same thing happened when Brad Pitt was cast as Aldo
Raine in IB and he turned out to be inspired casting. Foxx is great
as Django, at first he's unsure of Schultz and finds everything
that's happening to him too sudden but eventually he finds his feet,
his calling. Foxx becomes a sort of slave superhero as word of the
free slave is killing white men for the justice system. I've never
been a huge fan of Foxx although I thought he was fantastic as Ray
Charles in Ray but he's really really good as Django and I know he's
taken some flack for taking this role due to the over use of the 'N'
word. Schultz was clearly written for Christoph Waltz and much like
IB, he commands the screen as the charming yet very dangerous
ex-dentist turned bounty hunter. Every scene he's in he owns. His
delivery of Tarantino's lines, his interplay with Foxx and his
confrontation with Calvin Candie are stand out moments in the film.
Leonardo De Caprio continues to prove just how versatile an actor he
is from his fresh faced days of Romeo & Juliet and Titanic to his
more adult roles in Inception and The Departed, here though he takes
a role that is very different to those flawed by heroic type
characters he's played many times before with Candie being a
despicable human being, he's both charming and dangerous like Schultz
but where as Schultz was sincere and looked out for his fellow man,
Candie is manipulative, racist and dishonest. The rest of cast is a
sort of who's who of character actors such as James Remar (The
Warriors) who plays two characters, M.C Gainy (Lost) and Don Johnson
and there are cameos by people such as Tarantino regular Michael
Parks, Bruce Dern, Jonah Hill and the original Django himself, Franco
Nero, but my favourite role in the film belongs to Samuel L.Jackson
as Candie's 'House Nigger', Stephen. Stephen is just as bad as
Candie, maybe even worse and the fact that this black man rides upto
the house, which back then was something you never saw, shows that
Stephen, who has been in the Candie Family's employ for most of his
life, so there's a definite air of jealousy there. He also has some
of the best lines and while they do usually contain the N word or
Jackson's trade mark Mother fucker, they are alternatively chilling
and hilarious.
The
film looks incredible, Tarantino's directing has evolved so much
since his Reservoir Dogs/Pulp Fiction days, Django is handled
superbly, the action scenes are brutal and balletic but never seem to
over do the stylised action of more contemporary movies, the
shoot-out towards the end takes in styles of John Woo and Sam
Peckinpah and have a gritty Walter Hill texture to them. When the
bullets start flying and people start dying, the amount of blood
surpasses anything QT has done before, Kill Bill had cartoon
violence, IB had blink and you'll miss it bursts of violence that are
over in seconds, but Django revels in it's gory glory, thank god for
whoever invented the squib, that man was a genius. When bullets hit
flesh, blood spurts out of the wound, covering everything. This is
how violence should be done in 18/R rated films, none of this pansy
ass CGI blood.
I've
read many reviews of Django and whilst a lot on the non professional
reviews have stated how this is the best film Tarantino has made,
most of the professional reviews have stated that while it is a good
film, it is over long, the narrative has some major pacing issues and
the overuse of the derogatory N word does hinder the film, I have to
agree with most of the professional reviews, as an almost life long
QT fan I did find the film to be flawed and a little over long, there
was a good 25 minutes that could be removed such as the KKK scene and
the soundtrack misses the mark at points which is unusual for a
Tarantino movie, but it's still an incredibly enjoyable film, it's
head and shoulders above Death Proof but it lacks the energy and care
that was put into Inglourious Basterds.
Some
parts of the film seemed rushed and it pains me to say this, I found
myself getting a little bit bored by all the dialogue scenes, which
has never happened to me before when it comes to a QT script. In
closing, for a homage to Spaghetti Westerns, it's a great film for
people in the know, for casual film goers, they might find it a bit
too much. I enjoyed the film but not as much as I was expecting too.
But i'll never give up on Tarantino, he's still only in his teens
when it comes to his out put so I'm hoping we'll get one more Pulp
Fiction or Jackie Brown out of this one of a kind film maker before
he hangs up his view finder, but for now, this is fun popcorn film
making but nowhere near the best we've seen from Quentin Tarantino.
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