World War II, in German-occupied France, a group of Jewish American soldiers instills fear in the Nazis by brutally killing and scalping soldiers.

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Once in America, occupied by cheap video rentals, a young boy named Quentin, who was already in love with the magic of cinema, watched a second-rate Italian military action movie under the original name ‘Quel Maledetto Treno Blindato’ (‘Devil’s Armored Train’), in which only good was a frivolous attitude to the Second World War, and the monstrous power of the title ‘Inglourious Basterds’, hastily issued to the film for distribution in the United States and deeply entrenched in the mind of the future director.

Become ambitious enough to start writing the script of his own ‘Bastards’, Tarantino managed only in 97th year, when he already had all those films behind him, for which they still love him. As it turned out during the development of the plot, Quentin even had too many ideas in his head – at some stages the Bastards began to grow into a full-fledged mini-series. However, after a landmark dinner with Luc Besson, it was nevertheless decided to throw out all unnecessary storylines and confine ourselves to a full meter.

Due to the fact that the concept of the film has changed regularly over the course of eight years, there is no real titular character in ‘Bastards’. Tarantino himself thought it would be a young Frenchwoman Shoshanna Dreyfus (but the aggressive bride Uma Thurman put an end to the theme of ‘vengeful woman’ in his work) film), but in fact, the very glue that does not allow the picture to fall to pieces is the unhealthy gravitation towards dairy products, Standartenführer Hans Landa.

However, the absence of a general storyline, Tarantino himself, if not invented, then did it anew in his debut works, so you will not surprise anyone with such a turn of affairs. In ‘Bastards’, however, the story is much simpler and does not have any temporal and geographical leaps. There are five chapters here in a well-organized sequence. Three groups of characters: funny and cruel Jews, the British with a ‘bar in the globe’ and a vengeful French woman with her Negro projectionist. They all have one goal and one opposing force in the person of the witty “hunter of the Jews.” As a result, all this, as it should be, will be reduced to a twenty-minute finale, located somewhere beyond the edge of madness and courage.

If someone, for some reason for himself, assumed that Inglourious Basterds was such a “historical thriller” or “war movie,” he seriously missed his expectations. As such, there is no action or epic military sketches. Fascists go to the cinema for stupid propaganda films, shoot young French women and jam schnapps in basements. Jews practice polyglotism, play Indians, and have nightmares for people in gray uniforms. And Standartenführer Hans Landa just talks a lot with everyone.

If you try to describe ‘Bastards’ in a few words, it turns out that this is an extremely calm two and a half hours of florid and witty dialogues in four languages: German, English, Italian and French – Tarantino’s unique conversational magic has become a truly international heritage. There are scenes of shooting and swearing too, but they are rare bright flashes in the leisurely narrative manner generally accepted here.

The historical accuracy of Tarantino is only interested in until it starts to conflict with his own fantasy, so many things in ‘Bastards’ happen not because it really was in the forties, but because it looks very cool on the screen. So the Jews here behave like Apaches, the Frenchwoman easily remembers the face of her offender through a thin gap in the floor, the first-class German actress drinks with the officers in some incomprehensible basement, and Hitler is just a caricatured unbalanced idiot with a pathetic couple of people on guard. Therefore, there is no smell of boring historical doom in the style of the recent Singer’s ‘Valkyrie’, five minutes before the final credits it begins to seem that the unexpected appearance of aliens would look appropriate in Tarantino.

As for Brad Pitt, he is simply monumental here. With a grin, it seems, stolen from Marlon Brando and completely unique Italian. One thing is bad – there is not enough of it on the screen, but the main acting work in the film still belongs not to him, but to the polyglot Christoph Waltz, who threw his SS man Land to some absolutely transcendental heights of depth and elaboration (down to the slightest finger gestures). Eli Roth is best remembered for his devilish facial expressions and authorship of the fictional film Pride of the Nation. Quentin’s taste for female beauty has not disappeared either: the images of the plaster heel on the leg of Diane Kruger and the flaming face of Melanie Laurent remain in memory for a long time.

With the release of each of his new films, Tarantino is sure to be publicly flogged. And over and over again, someone considers it necessary to say that Quentin, they say, has completely written out, filmed, directed, slipped into mediocrity, and the times of his triumphs are forever gone. But for now, the cult director, despite everything, continues to look everywhere for inspiration, maintain confidence, sparkle in his eyes and make films exclusively for himself, which are shown in cinemas as if only so that this ‘music plays forever’.

Even taking into account, perhaps, the most grandiose finale in Tarantino’s career, Inglourious Basterds is more like a kind of exercise in skill than a complete picture from all sides. It is pleasant to realize that this exercise is performed perfectly well, and the maestro still dashingly manages to play verbal ping-pong with the audience. Before going on the ‘Inglourious Basterds’, it is important to realize that the best is still the worst enemy of the good, and we can somehow manage without the new ‘Reservoir Dogs’, but not without Tarantino.

Info Blu-ray
Video
Codec: HEVC / H.265 (49.4 Mb/s)
Resolution: Upscaled 4K (2160p)
HDR: HDR10+
Aspect ratio: 2.39:1
Original aspect ratio: 2.39:1

Audio
English: DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 (48kHz, 24-bit)
English: Dolby Digital 5.1
French: DTS 5.1
Spanish: DTS 5.1

Subtitles
English SDH, French, Spanish.