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Friday, December 11, 2009

BD impressions: Inglourious Basterds

5:03 PM / BD Impressions / 7 Comments

In his review of Inglourious Basterds, Mark Kermode said that the film had some good ideas in it but didn't really work as a whole, or words to that effect. While I like Quentin Tarantino's latest opus a lot more than the esteemed Dr. K. did, I think there's some level of truth in what he said about it. I've been growing more and more convinced that Tarantino just doesn't make great movies. What he does make are movies with great moments in them, and these moments tend to be memorable enough that they overshadow the lesser elements in the long run.

Inglourious Basterds has a lot of these great moments in it. Unfortunately, like the previous Death Proof, it also has a lot of overly long, rambling and frankly tedious dialogue scenes in which characters sit and talk to each other about subjects that are only tangentially (if at all) related to the plot. This is most pronounced in the extended sequence in which the eponymous Basterds meet German double agent Bridget von Hammersmark (Diane Kruger) in a tavern outside Paris. This is meant to be a straightforward rendezvous, but it turns sour when they find themselves in the company of a band of rowdy German soldiers and a Gestapo officer. The outcome of the scene is terrific and has lasting consequences that alter the manner in which the film's climax plays out, but rather than getting down to business, Tarantino leaves the audience dangling for what seems like ages, eking out an ultimately irrelevant game of "Guess Who?" that seems to exist for no other reason than to allow him to indulge in movie trivia via the on-screen characters.

Death Proof's entire raison d'être, the thing that made all the waffle worthwhile in the long run, was the spectacular car chase that comprised the film's climax. Likewise, the memory of Inglourious Basterds' less engaging scenes (and believe me, there are a lot of them) fades away when all the principle players descend on the Le Gamaar cinema for a movie premiere that literally sets the audience on fire. Taken as a whole, the film seems ill-disciplined and in need of some judicious editing but, watching as the face of Jewish orphan Shosanna Dreyfus (Mélanie Laurent) fills the cinema screen and informs a packed audience of Nazi bigwigs that every one of them is about to die, it's hard not to think - if only for a few moments - "Fuck it, this is a great movie." I don't know how he does it, but Tarantino repeatedly puts out films that, by rights, shouldn't work and a lot of the time don't work. When they cook, though, they really cook.

By the way, despite the film's title, this is Shosanna's story. I was surprised by just how peripheral the Basterds actually were in the outcome. When all said and done, they might as well not have bothered showing up. In fact, you could argue that things would have gone a lot more smoothly if they hadn't. As far as the acting is concerned, the honours definitely go to Mélanie Laurent and Christoph Waltz, the latter playing the deceptively polite but utterly deadly "Jew hunter" Hans Landa. The Basterds themselves are basically caricatures, and not particularly interesting caricatures at that, but Laurent and Waltz are blessed with the two most interesting parts in the script, and they utterly nail their respective roles.

Image quality: This is a fantastic disc from Universal. Inglourious Basterds is Tarantino's first anamorphic film since Pulp Fiction, and I was actually slightly surprised when I saw the film's first instance of anamorphic lens distortion, as the image has a razor sharpness that one doesn't normally associate with the process. The level of fine detail on display is frequently jaw-dropping - just look at all those facial pores in the close-ups, not to mention Mélanie Laurent's moles. Fine grain is visible throughout, and always looks natural and unmolested. The encode really is stellar - if there are any visible compression artefacts, I didn't spot them.

The only real flaw is something that I suspect stems from the downconversion process from a 4K master, and that is some light aliasing on diagonal edges. It doesn't show up too often, but when it does the effect is mildly distracting. The brim of Christoph Waltz's hat suffers quite a bit in the opening sequence, and the shutters in Example 7, plus the curvature of the cinema's billboard, show it up as well. Otherwise, though, top marks all round. 9.5/10

Inglourious Basterds
studio: Universal; country: UK; region code: ABC; codec: AVC;
file size: 34.8 GB; average bit rate (including audio): 32.62 Mbit/sec

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