Inglourious Basterds Review

“I think this just might be my masterpiece.”

That’s the last line of dialogue in Quentin Tarantino’s “Inglourious Basterds,” but it’s not exactly a stretch to also imagine it as the self-referential director’s way of laying out his ambitions to his audience.

Before I go on, I feel like I should note that I’m a big fan of Tarantino’s work. I simply think he’s one of the most exciting and talented filmmakers working today. I’m telling you this just so you know that there’s a 10 percent chance this review is influenced by my love of almost all things Tarantino.

Another reason I’m bringing this up is because a love of all things Tarantino is helpful — but absolutely NOT essential — to enjoying “Basterds.” (If you were hoping for an explanation for the title’s misspelling, for example, you should probably just move along.)

Based on the TV commercials, the movie purports to be about a ragtag group of Jewish-American soldiers known as “the Basterds” and led by Lt. Aldo Raine (Brad Pitt), whose sole purpose is to hunt Nazi’s in France during World War II.

As a result, I was surprised and a little delighted that the Basterds turned out to be the least interesting part of the movie.

Don’t get me wrong, there’s plenty of fun to be had in the action-adventure portions of the movie involving the Basterds. On top of that, Pitt gives a committed, funny and thoroughly enjoyable performance (especially when Aldo speaks Italian). This just confirms the notion that Pitt is generally more effective as an oddball supporting player (think “12 Monkeys”, “Snatch”, “Burn After Reading”) than he is as a leading man (“Troy”, “Meet Joe Black”, etc.) — he’s basically the world’s most famous character actor.

It’s just that the Basterds end up being little more than caricatures in Tarantino’s vivid, violent and (not-literally-)animated recasting of history. (They’re fun caricatures, but caricatures nonetheless.)

Instead, Tarantino seems to have saved all that characterization business for a couple of characters who end up walking away with the movie.

Melanie Laurent is terrific as a young woman living in France who owns a movie theatre that ends up playing a prominent role in the plot. (I know it’s been more than a month since the movie came out, but you still won’t catch me giving plot details away if I can help it.) Laurent convincingly conveys her character’s vulnerability and strength and should end up with an Oscar nomination in a few months.

(Not far behind — and showing that, for all the fanBOYS who seem to love his work, Tarantino writes some of the best roles for women today — is Diane Kruger as German movie star Bridget von Hammersmark. To me, this was Kruger becoming a movie star.)

The other character you won’t be able to take your eyes off of is Col. Hans Landa, the brilliant and devastatingly pragmatic German officer known as “the Jew Hunter.” Since I want you to experience the joys of this performance on your own, all I’ll say is that Austrian actor Christoph Waltz gives the best performance I’ve seen all year (and probably will see all year).

Waltz and Laurent excel in those signature Tarantino scenes that develop slowly and are almost entirely reliant on dialogue. (Some people find them boring, but I think they’re the perfect balance to all the Basterds/scalping craziness.)

Those scenes also serve to flesh out some of the vibrant supporting players, including Michael Fassbender as a British officer passing himself off as German, Til Schweiger as a badass Basterd worthy of his own highlight reel, Daniel Bruhl as a Sergeant York-esque German hero/movie star, and Mike Myers as a British General. (Seriously!)

Of course, Tarantino also can’t help from going up his own ass at times. In more than a few instances, “Basterds” indirectly or directly referenced the director’s own previous work. There’s an especially strong whiff of “Kill Bill.” (The movie is split into five chapters; several musical cues were identical.) However, Tarantino’s characters have always operated in a sort of alternate universe so it’s not what I would call an egregious offense.

I don’t know if I’d say this is the director’s masterpiece (or if he’d even say that), but I’d certainly say it’s his most ambitious effort and one of the best movies of the year.

Inglourious Basterds…A