Django Unchained

[UnSub]

Quentin could give two shits, which gives him way more freedom to make great films.

QT's freedom comes from being a film nerd who has made a number of finacially and critically successful films (although the critical success has dampened quite a bit from his early days). If he started to make films that bombed financially he'd find it a lot harder to have that freedom.

Plus he'll probably never want to make a 'message' film, which is what Lee did in the past. But to that end, Lee getting upset about "Django Unchained" will be about as effective as World War II historians being upset about "Inglorious Basterds"(or "U-571", for that matter).

[Lakov_Sanite]

I think he does make message films, he just also tries to make them very entertaining.

[Jeff Kelly]

Saw it today.

My first impression was that I rather like the more mature Tarantino style.

Why didn't he go all the way though? The call backs to 'quintessential' Tarantino where grating at times and didn't quite fit with the rest of the movie.

I was positively surprised that QT can do heavy without it being silly and then he went being silly again and I thought 'what the fuck was that for'?

[sickrubik]

Saw it today.

My first impression was that I rather like the more mature Tarantino style.

Why didn't he go all the way though? The call backs to 'quintessential' Tarantino where grating at times and didn't quite fit with the rest of the movie.

I was positively surprised that QT can do heavy without it being silly and then he went being silly again and I thought 'what the fuck was that for'?

What parts are you talking about specifically, just out of curiosity?

[Jeff Kelly]

What parts are you talking about specifically, just out of curiosity?

To me Django unchained showed that Tarantino has a more serious side. Most of the movie works great even though it is a departure from Tarantino's signature style.

Even some of the sillier elements fit with that. It's a story about Django and how he learns to be free and self reliant.  Calvin Candy talks about that when he makes his speech about the old slave and about how they didn't just kill all of the white people or when he talks about Django as  'one in ten thousand'. But Django doesn't start off as the one in ten thousand he first has to become that person.

It's also the journey of KIng Schultz who became Bounty Hunter for the sheer thrill of it but came to realize that he could no longer make the southern US his personal playground. He realized that he had to take a stand. He and Django talk about it when Django asks him why he helps him to which he answers 'I never gave a man his freedom before and I feel kind of responsible for you'. He sees that the people who give him money for killing the bad guys are basically even worse. He's sort of the 'Anti-Alda', he's also like the basic anti-hero character who redeems himself by doing the 'right thing' for once in his life.

So it even goes with the tone that the movie starts off with a mixture of exploitative brutality and humor and even that it keeps the theme going for a time.

Tarantino even plays with the theme. He tries to make the audience see the world through the eyes of King Schultz as he counters scenes of sheer absurdity with scenes of sheer brutality. It's like if you and your friends went to Disney world and then have to realize that its KKK day at the magic kingdom. It's like 'we came to have fun, why are all of those white angry douches ruining it for us'. You hate it and really wish for the things to happen that King Schultz and Django then do in the end.

The violence in the end has a real cathartic effect after what you experienced beforehand.

We even had some people walk out of the movie because they didn't get what they expected (a fun if violent romp Tarantino is known for) or because they simply didn't want to experience the explicit brutality anymore.

I presume that this was exactly what he was going for because it is a continuation of the theme from Inglorious Basterds. Making the audience realize that what they are entertained by is brutal violence and forcing them to deal with that.

In my mind the movie works very well on many levels but it is diminished in a way by some of the Tarantino-isms he just couldn't let go. So there are elements that really clash with the theme of the movie and I found some stylistic choices or parts of the narrative or presentation to be grating since it pretty much got me out of it at times.

Example: The ridiculously large and slow moving 'MISSISSIPPI' caption between two takes or the whole KKK scene which was ridiculously funny but somehow felt like it belonged in an entirely different movie or the over the top blood and gore splattering when Django kills someone

The film was gut wrenching, visually stunning and dramatic at times and then it completely breaks what it built up by a sort of silly joke at exactly the wrong time like the one person who kind of has to make fun of difficult situations because he can't deal with thing getting real.

In my mind the movie could have been really great if Tarantino would have gone all the way and if he could have let go of his silliness and really embraced where this film was going. It felt to me as if Tarantino was surprised by where he went with that film himself and inserted his Tarantino-ism for that.

I'm probably overanalyzing the fuck out of that movie but I really felt that there was a whole other great film in there Tarantiono was too afraid to do.

[Jeff Kelly]

Also my django unchained pet peeve:

There are probably a dozen different tellings and retellings of the Nibelung saga about Siegfried both from Norse and German mythology and they differ in key elements like names, places or even key plot elements. It is sort of a mythical retelling of key historical events of central and northern european history. It goes from the defeat of the roman general Varus by the German Arminius through the migration period after the sacking of rome when the Germanic tribes took control of most of what was left from the western roman empire and the first Germanic kingdoms arose and the struggle with the slavic tribes (like the huns led by Attila) that pushed them westwards. It sort of tells how things came to be as they were in 11th century Europe while foregoing historical accuracy (or facts).

Most of the names were altered or changed to fit the local languages and customs, the story was connected to the Norse or Germanic pantheon (basically the same with different names) and it was put into an entirely mythical context where most of the important historical figures where in a way either related to the gods or to other mythical or supernatural beings. For example Brunhilde in the Nibelung is a Valkyrie that got punished by Odin for being disobedient and imprisoned behind the wall of fire King Schultz talks about in the movie. 'Brunhilde' is the literal translation of 'ildikó' which is supposedly the name of one of Attila's wives and 'Etzel' the King that wants to marry 'Krimhilde' after her husband Siegfried was murdered is literally (as in Germanic reproduction of the name) Attila the Hun.

The most famous German tale of the Nibelung would be the "Nibelungenlied" which is a series of poems from 11th century Germany and King Schultz is correct in that every German with a classical education would probably know about the story and the historical context (as the last few paragraphs of me nerding out about it clearly show) however the story he tells Django is from none of those historical texts.

The story he tells Django is from Richard Wagner's cycle of epic operas 'The Rhine Gold', 'The Valkyrie', 'Siegfried' and 'Twilight of the Gods' that comprise the 'Ring des Nibelungen'. Wagner spent most of his life researching as much about Norse and Germanic history and mythology as possible and the story he told in the 'Ring' is his own interpretation and also an amalgamation of different stories and texts that also includes parts of the Grail saga and elements from other important mythological texts.

 The premiere of the 'Ring' cycle was in August of 1876 in Bayreuth, Germany so King Schultz would have never heard about that particular version of the story since he'd been roaming the south for years before he met Django in 1878. Even if he did hear about it he also told it wrong. Siegfried never married Brunhilde. He rescued her but not from a Dragon but from a prison built by father of the gods Odin himself.

Brunhilde is actually the one that orchestrates Siegfried's murder because Siegfried disgraced her and let that disgrace become public.

[Abagadro]

The movie takes place in 1858.

I think you might be over-thinking what is basically a spaghetti western. Nutty anachronistic stuff is part of their charm.

[sickrubik]

Example: The ridiculously large and slow moving 'MISSISSIPPI' caption between two takes or the whole KKK scene which was ridiculously funny but somehow felt like it belonged in an entirely different movie or the over the top blood and gore splattering when Django kills someone

In my mind the movie could have been really great if Tarantino would have gone all the way and if he could have let go of his silliness and really embraced where this film was going. It felt to me as if Tarantino was surprised by where he went with that film himself and inserted his Tarantino-ism for that.

I'm probably overanalyzing the fuck out of that movie but I really felt that there was a whole other great film in there Tarantiono was too afraid to do.

Tarantino was not afraid of anything. The dude simply does not give a fuck. He makes genre films. And that is exactly why the MISSISSIPPI style thing is there. However, there is plenty to analyze in a Tarantino movie seeing as he is a god damn walking Wikipedia of film. But he's not Spielberg and he's not Joel or Ethan Coen. He's Tarantino and his love for genre films is what separates him and also what allows him to pull off the MISSISSIPPI style of things.

That being said, specifically that kind of stuff is most notable in his last two movies. All of his films have quirks in them, but that sort of thing was important for the time of film he was paying homage to.

The movie you are looking for would be fun, but would not be a Tarantino flick.

[tazelbain]

I agree that is a genre piece but I still think he was keenly aware that this would offend the "sanitize history" crowd and was happy to poke them in the eye. It is incredibly topical in a country were a large segment is experiencing existential dread that we elected and re-elected a black president and is trying erase slavery from the textbooks.

[sickrubik]

Of course he was. He's said as much. I don't think the two are mutually exclusive.

[Amarr HM]

Tarantinos' best work since Pulp Fiction, amazing soundtrack too. I couldn't believe it was over 2½ hours long, it just whizzed by.

[MahrinSkel]

I liked it just for how much it was pissing off the closet racists in my blogroll, especially the ones that try to pretend their confederacy boosterism has nothing to do with racism.  It grabs ante-bellum romantics by the back of the neck and rubs their nose in just how nasty the  'peculiar institution' was.

It managed to be a really good movie on top of it, the first time in a long time I saw a movie in the theater and felt it was worth the ticket price.

--Dave

[Ratman_tf]

Bought it on blu ray today. Loved it. I'm torn on the tone shifting from funny to serious and back. For a moment, the hooded numbskulls, it was Blazing Saddles. 
But I laughed pretty hard, so it worked.

I... was expecing much more of the N-word. After Pulp Fiction's "Dead nigger storage" scene, Django was kinda mellow.

[Lakov_Sanite]

I believe "Is that a n**** on a horse?" was also a blazing saddles reference.

[schild]

My hatred for Tarantino aside, and the inconsistent quality of the "flashbacks" for Django, this movie was absolutely superb. I'm basically convinced the Waltz can make basically anything better.

[Lakov_Sanite]

To me, as a fan of Tarantino before I see this as him really starting to refine his style into something beyond fan wankery love letters other movies(though I still like his older stuff)  

Waltz plays no small part in what makes this movie great but looking back I think this and to a lesser degree Inglorious Basterds, will be marked as a turning point in Tarantino's career.

[schild]

Inglorious Basterds was by far the most entertaining movie he'd made. Letting Waltz take the lead for 2 hours and 10 minutes in Django was precisely what he needed to do though. That guy is a wizard.

[HaemishM]

Inglorious Basterds was by far the most entertaining movie he'd made.

I thought it was utter wankery of the lowest kind, worse than Kill Bill. I agree that Walz was certainly the best thing in it, though.

[Khaldun]

Geez, I liked Inglorious and I really hate Tarantino's earlier stuff. I need to see this, I think.

[Merusk]

You need to watch it at least once, if only to see why Waltz earned every milligram of that Oscar.

[Brofellos]

Curse Netflix for not having this available.

[MrHat]

Curse Netflix for not having this available.

Think it's like $4 to stream it from your service of choice.

[schild]

schildflix has it.