The penny finally dropped: Quentin Tarantino simply has no imagination. He can’t create characters so he borrows bits from characters in films he’s seen. He can’t create a believable setting or narrative, so he echoes, parodies, de-constructs those of others. He is either passive or unaffected by reality or possesses no imaginative resources with which to express the feelings and emotions it arouses. He's like a guy who takes an armchair to the beach because he's never seen a film with a deckchair in it.

Tarantino’s film career - always derivative, always parasitic on other Directors, writers, genres – is a desperate struggle to spin imagination and original creative thought out of mere fantasy and the increasingly desperate fanciful manipulation of commonplace ideas and concepts. That is why his films always mark the triumph of style over substance; visceral shock over sustained tension or suspense; scabrous humour and adolescent rebelliousness over wit, comic originality or genuine dissent.

Do your own test: the dictionary associates the following qualities with 'imagination' – constructive, creative, mental creative ability, creative act of perception. The qualities associated with 'fantasy' are: illusion, hallucination, whimsical, far-fetched – ‘a series of pleasing mental images usually fulfilling a need not satisfied in reality’. Has Tarantino ever created a character you can imagine having a life off the screen? Do any of his characters convey any sense of having a ‘life’ a history before we meet them in his movies?

The inability to create characters is aesthetically fatal for Tarantino. His films track a downward path driven by the law of diminishing returns. Credible characters do so much for you: they drive narrative, establish context, create a base from which variation from the norm and the unexpected generates the surprise from which wit, irony and humour emerge. Characterless, so to speak, Tarantino is forced to rely on those things he is, or was good at – words, homage, reference, and assembling but not conceiving of images. This void at the heart of his films is now making him increasingly desperate to control what he can control: dialogue, shocking images and an increasingly anal pre-occupation with songs and music in his films. I heard a documentary, a documentary, God help us, talking of Tarantino’s ‘genius’ in his nerdish precision in fitting obscure song tracks precisely to the frame in his movies. This is anorakism that only fellow anorak’s can understand and no one but fellow anoraks would want to.

Inglourious Basterds is a paradox: a poor, even tedious film containing one superlative performance. This was justly recognized at Cannes when experienced Austrian actor Christoph Waltz walked off with the best actor award. Quite an achievement when you consider that poor Christoph’s beautifully nuanced character, Nazi ‘Jew-Hunter’ Colonel Hans Landa only has one credible character to play off who disappears after the first and best scene in the movie.

Tarantino’s writing qualities are evident in this first scene when French farmer Perrier la Paditte (Denis Menochet) and Landa have a chillingly banal conversation with the amiable tone of a census officer ticking boxes but with the subtext of Jewish fugitives listening under the floorboards. Landa knows and la Paditte knows he knows and the surreal little game Landa plays, veiling implacable inhumanity with ineffable courtesy, charm and politeness is tense and chilling. Maybe characters frighten Tarentino: threaten his control. This tense, superbly written and played scene is suddenly blown apart for a cheap Pythonesque laugh about the relative size of the two men’s pipes. Of course we laugh: but everything built up in the scene is thrown away - for a giggle. Pure Tarantino but the great directors he admires used to say implicitly ‘look at my film - if you would know me’; Tarantino can’t stop himself saying ‘look at me – if you would know my film’. And when we look we just see the insubstantial flash, not the clever writer who can make us listen.

IB has a comic book plot. It is 1941 in occupied France: Landa is proving diabolically good at mopping up any remaining Jews in France. Meanwhile, in the spirit of Robert Aldrich’s The Dirty Dozen (1967) a group of vengeful Jewish GIs are formed led by Brad Pitt’s Lieutenant Aldo Raine suffering from the self-inflicted wound of an accent sounding like George W Bush auditioning for Rhet Butler; and looking like a square-jawed, stiff-necked Sterling Hayden just out of re-hab. Raine claims part Indian blood and tells his men they will embark on a Nazi-killing spree using scalp-collecting, mutilation and torture to strike fear into the Nazis. He likens this campaign to that of the Apaches in resisting white settlers and the US Army.

As with most of QT’s films one gets the overwhelming impression that the actors are having a whale of a time, sending up each other, their characters, the narrative and any sense of seriousness about making movies. The whole enterprise comes over as an ‘in’ joke cleverly pitched to the audience to say ‘if you’re cool, you’ll get it, then you can join our gang and take the piss out of the poor schmucks who don’t.’ There were a few people in the cinema who started by laughing exaggeratedly at moments which at best warranted an ironic smile. But as the invention and style of the first scene was not recreated in the rest of the film, even these afficionados fell silent. QT suffers from the law of diminishing returns - both between and within his movies.

In the risible narrative, one survivor from Paditte’s farm, Shoshanna Dreyfus, escapes to return mysteriously later in the movie re-born as Emmanualle Mimieux, running a cinema in occupied Paris. ‘Apache’ Raine and Co are now operational, their star turn being the terrifying ‘Bear Jew’ (Sgt Donny Donowitz) whose fame is spreading - Nazi brains………..with a baseball bat.

Emmanuelle meanwhile attracts the amorous attention of Private Frederick Zoller (Daniel Bruhl – Bourne Ultimatum, 2 Days in Paris), a German crack sniper whose exploits in killing 300 GIs are celebrated in a propaganda film ‘A Nation’s Pride’ set up by Goebbels. Zoller persuades Goebbels to hold the premier of ‘A Nation’s Pride’ in Emmanuelle’s cinema to ingratiate himself with her. As the premiere is to be attended by all the top Nazis, eventually including Hitler himself – interlocking storylines have Emmanuelle, the Basterds and a British covert operation led by Lt Archie Hicox (Michael Fassbender) hooking up with the common objective of ending the war by killing all the top Nazis in one go with the aid of a British double agent, German actress Bridget Von Hammersmark ((Diane Kruger).

Much mayem, blood-letting, brain-spattering ensues generating not a moment’s moral engagement or pause. OK “that’s the point you schmuck” I hear QT intone. Mea culpa. But what might have been grotesquely, dangerously funny becomes increasingly laboured, lacking even the visual wit and style of the Kill Bill or especially Pulp Fiction products. Despite some good moments much of this plays like out-takes from ‘Allo ‘Allo. The violent scenes do elicit in some what we might call the Tarantino ‘giggle’ – manic, slightly embarrassed and oddly conspiratorial.

It is quite impossible, except for the superb Waltz, to tell when the dreadful, clunky acting is intentional or just dumb; because it is so clunky, so transparently dumb it just ain’t funny most of the time. Like a second rate joke told badly by someone who apologetically announces ‘I can’t tell jokes’.

The film is in four languages - French, English, German, and ‘Italian’ (you’ll realise why the ‘ ‘). This could have been really funny but apart from a subtle use in the opening scene, QT simply fails to exploit the possibilities – except perhaps in an overlong scene when an SS officer unmasks the British agent because of a crap German accent and signalling ‘3’ with his fingers in a non-German way. No I have no idea if Germans do have a distinctive way of indicating ‘3’ with their fingers: though I do know Brits do with ‘2’. So maybe it’s an esoteric German joke – if that’s not an oxymoron.

Inglourious Basterds for me lacks by definition (see above) creative imagination. Even QT’s characteristic sense of visual style – shallow but shiny, fails him and the usual flashily funny or wittily ironic dialogue just clunks. It is the film of a persistently over-praised Director who simply refuses to grow up, come out of the garage where his mates always laugh at the in-jokes, and start trying to mature a talent for dialogue and a genuine love of movies into a film about the kind of world the rest us live in – even if only to mock it.

IB for me is a mess: QT left out the pace, the style, and the wit – and without these there is nothing left in a QT movie; no characters to identify with; no coherent narrative to engage; no substance to provoke.

As with all Tarantino movies the hype is being superbly orchestrated, no doubt funded by the producing Weinstein Company which by all accounts desperately needs a money-spinner. The hype will tweak the admission price from Tarantino fans – for the rest, I’d save your money.

If I am right about QT’s lack of creative imagination, it would be a smart move for him to do a straight adaptation where plot and character are provided for him. He might even try to be funny in his own right using his talent for sassy, ironic dialogue to make something like an update of the Myrna Loy, William Powell Thin Man series of the 40s.

Either way this almost 20 year ‘enfant terrible’ of the movie business has reached a point where he only rates half the description. Either half. Not both.


http://zettelfilmreviews.co.u)

Z, it was a great relief to read this review. I'd been feeling totally constipated with mystified frustration with regard to QT (if only he was on it). But now your words have released a splatter-fest of psychic regurgitation, a little of which I've sprayed below.

QT's always been a one-trick cart horse, and it's not a very good trick either. I think it's supposed to be that he does hip dialogue. Well, I remember learning that he wrote an excruciating piece of dialogue for that submarine film with Denzel Washington - which was no surprise since that was the bit that had me chewing my fist with embarrassment. Denzel is the captain (I think) and he goes to talk to this young man who's scared about whatever the hell's happening (you see I'd make a good film critic). The young man just happens to have a copy of the Silver Surfer comic next to him. Denzel just happens to be a comics nut, and particularly likes the Silver Surfer. So they have this rappy exchange about who was the best SS artist - Jack Kirby or John Buscema. Well, first off Jack Kirby was drawing the SS back in the late 60s (yes, yes, I spent a lot of time in my bedroom too), so what would a young guy in the 90s know or care about him (genius though he was)? The point being that this scene is totally out of character and therefore, rather than achieve the desired result - experienced captain chats to young guy about something ordinary to calm his fears - all it does is tell us that QT knows a lot about comics. It also complete torpedoes (sorry), Denzel's character - because up to then he's come across as a dignified, wise leader, i.e. what the hell would he be doing reading comics, let alone admit to it in front of the men?

QT looks, talks and makes film exactly like a guy who's lived a second-hand life. Okay, you could argue that major audiences these days are the same, and therefore prefer the fur ball version of life. But it grates that he gets so much acclaim from critics who should know better. I tuned into a bit of Kill Bill the other day and at first thought it was a Smith and Jones piss-take of the Kung Fu TV series. Ah, but then I suppose a critic would know that that's exactly what QT intended: it's a reverse, double back-flip homage to David Carradine playing himself playing grasshopper (sorry, don't remember his name either) playing QT pretending to send up Bruce Lee while at the same time using black and white ironically to suggest that . . . oh, I give up. Honestly, it's enough to make you want to go and hang yourself in the wardrobe.

Keep telling it like it is, or at least should be, Z.

Terry

Thanks, Zettel. I always enjoy your reviews. You can't dislodge Pulp Fiction from my top ten, but QT has gove down river ever since and on the basis of what you've written I won't be watching IB.

~Rod.

thanks guys. we might still be in a minority - QT claims this is his masterpiece and the film has picked up much critical acclaim in the US. Mindboggling.

Terry - the other clunky bit of Crimson Tide was the stuff about Star Trek and fixing the warp drive. ho hum.

Rod - I thought Pulp Fiction was good but although totally derivative I still think Reservoir Dogs said all QT has ever really had to say.

Z

Hi Z,

Bowing to your knowledge, what was PF derivative of? I should go back to the original sources.

With Pulp Fiction I enjoyed the style and the characters - Vincent Vega, our man in Toluca Lake. Everything about the film, with the exceptions of certain appearances by QT himself, and certain anal rapes, had charm. I even made a pilgrimage to Toluca Lake when I was in California. Sad, I know. Everyone around me knew the whole script by heart, a bit like Withnail (which is also in my top ten). Somehow that film captured the essence of the moment we were living. Nothing deep to say about humanity, but pure entertainment. I'm ashamed, but sometimes that's what I want from the flicks.

Best, Rod.

<Added>

Close reading your post, perhaps you were saying that RD was derivative. I hated Reservoir Dogs because the gratuitous violence quotient outweighed the charm quotient.

Hey Rod

It was RD that I felt was particularly derivative though to degree so was PF and especially Jackie Brown. At the time in 1992 when RD came out people talked as if QT had invented the idea of a time-fractured narrative. Well check out Kubrick's 1956 The Killing just as inventive and without the gore.

I thought PF was good but again took much from the French New Wave approach to the gangster as existential hero, unpredictable, short-lived and uncompromising. Xavier Bardem's assassin in No Country for Old Men could have been a QT character but he wouldn't have grounded him in a meaningful, satisfying, thought-provoking narrative the way the cohen brothers did.

QT doesn't frustrate me because he's no good - he frustrates me because he refuses to make a movie of his that he has to stand by in its own right. He doesn't create visual causes that produces satisfying and varied effects in the watcher - he just gives you the effects on a plate. His films don't resonate - at all for me. Though they can be fun.

The music in PF for example worked! It had a purpose and added much to the film. Imagine though PF without Travolta on a comeback and Samuel L Jackson at his very early best. They were the backbone of the film - for once QT didn't waste the talent he had available he gave them something to DO - unlike IB.

Z

I've seen enough war films to recognise parody, but as a non-devotee I enjoyed the excesses of Tarantino's send-up. Scalping Nazis and carving swastikas where it showed seemed a particularly apt, if grotesque parody of the 'hitting Jerry where it hurts' revenge theme that's the usual excuse for a lot of flying limbs and mayhem.That the barmy army, under their part-Apache commander,about as silly as a redded-up Burt Lancaster playing a Comanche - are Jews, and for the most part not very soldierly was a master stroke.

Besides the excellent opening scene with its amazing camera work,there was a lot to like. The recreation of the Paris suburban cinema scenes was superb,I thought,the suspense enlivened by the humour of the Basterds pretending to be Italians, up against an opponent with fluent command of the language. Goebbels as director making promises to his 'dicovery' was funny, as was the faux-b/w footage of the 'hero' in action.The mechanics of the back-screen conflagration with the pile of old celluloid and the use of different cinema spaces was convincing,with cleverly edited cuts between activities in the projection room where the heroine was substituting reels, the accounts office where the conspirator was tied up and being interrogated and the champagne drinking tension in the foyer.Not to mention the dynamite strapped to legs in the audience. Add the atmospheric novelty of the scene with heroine up a ladder changing the display letters, and the film deserves a place in the annals of great films-about-cinema, such as Woody Allen's 'The Purple Rose of Cairo', Tornatore's 'Cinema Paradiso'and Hitchcock's 'Secret Agent'.

I also suspect that where critics cry 'derivative'there's an element of resentment at Tarantino's less than reverential attitude to the whole war-film genre.For me that's a bonus, but it reminds me a bit of why my partner hates 'Sing-along-a Sound of Music'. Nothing to do with it being a bad film - he just thinks its making fun of Julie Andrews.

Making fun of Julie Andrews?

Is nothing sacred?

Hey

Z

Yes, he really freaked out in Bromley one time when he saw all the spoof costumes. Well, he frowned a lot, which for him is freaking out.

Sorry, the Hitchcock film was Sabotage. I think the book on which it was based on was The Secret Agent

Sheila