J.C. Maçek III The World's Greatest Critic!!! My name is J.C. Maçek III and FUH-HUH-HUCK do I ever hate Nazis! The only GOOD Nazi is a DEAD Nazi... and even those douches aren't worth hawking a loogie on! As much as I detest Nazis, that's how much I love movies about Nazis getting punished, tortured, killed and even having their lunch money stolen. Unfortunately, in most Nazisploitation flicks, one has to sit through a while hell of a lot of Nazis being Nazis before the final Revenge climax that satisfies, but not soon enough. This is why I'm an instant fan of the much-anticipated flick Inglourious Basterds! Yeah, immediate fan as in Midnight, Opening Morning... and, yes, Much Anticipated as in having waited for this promised film for over a decade. Did it disappoint? Hmmmmmmm... did a movie about Jewish American Soldiers parachuting into Nazi-Occupied France to commit beautiful atrocities against Nazis disappoint? Hell no, kids... we're talking about Quentin Tarantino and his World War II flick! We're talking about just desserts for the Nazis... but folks, Inglourious Basterds is much, much more than just that alone! While it's true that Exploitation Flicks have covered a lot of the same ground as Tarantino's flick, Inglourious Basterds is no exploitation flick, any more than Kill Bill is a Kung Fu feature. Tarantino does what he has always done best... he takes his inspirations, most commonly from the B-Movie subgenres and makes a truly A-List film out of it with his strong sense of pace, framing and, most especially, DIALOGUE! Before the main brunt of our story, we are introduced to the cunning and monstrous "Jew Hunter" Nazi Colonel Hans Landa (the chillingly excellent Christoph Waltz). The man is no typical or stereotypical military mind. In fact, he is so cold and effective, in part, because he's intelligent and charming at the same time. Never does Tarantino or Waltz let one forget that for all his sheep-in-wolf's-clothing mannerisms, Landa is still a snake, just waiting to strike at the worst possible times. What may come back to haunt him, however, is the fact that his opening onslaught allows for a single escapee in the form of the lovely Jewish refugee Shosanna Dreyfus (Mélanie Laurent)! Meanwhile, half a world away, we're introduced to another awesome military leader in the form of US Army Lieutenant Aldo "The Apache" Raine (excellently portrayed by Brad Pitt)! Raine's duty (and unadulterated pleasure) is to assemble a squad of Jewish American Soldiers to drop into Hitler's France and give the Nazis the full on Auschwitz-Birkenau experience as slowly and painfully as possible, one Nazi Dick-Brain at a time. Once he's chosen his crazy eight (the titular Inglourious Basterds themselves) he tasks them each with bringing him one hundred Nazi Scalps... "And I WANT my SCALPS!" he says. Oh, and might I add... FUCK YEAH!!! Speaking of which... Fuck Yeah! The BASTERDS! SOUND OFF! 1.   Sgt. Donny Donowitz: The Bear Jew (played by a bulked-up Eli Fucking Roth) 2.   Lt. Archie Hicox (Michael Fassbender) 3.   Pfc. Omar Ulmer (Omar Doom) 4.   Corporal Wilhelm Wicki (Gedeon Burkhard) 5.   PFC Gerold Hirschberg (Samm Levine) 6.   PFC Andy Kagan (Paul Rust) 7.   PFC Michael Zimmerman (Michael Bacall) 8.   PFC Simon Sakowitz (Carlos Fidel) 9.   PFC Ira Rothstein (Paul Natland) 10.                PFC Smithson Utivich: The Little Man (B. J. NovaK) 11.                Hugo Stiglitz: The Nazi Nazi-Killer (Til Schweiger) Be it with knife, gun, fist, boot or BASEBALL BAT, the Basterds are punishing Nazi Punk Motherfuckers all across France, much, much, much, much, much to the Chagrin of one professional douche-bag furious Führer Adolf Fucking Hitler (played with the perfect amount of loathing mockery by Martin Wuttke). Aldo and company are true to their words about being "Cruel" to the Nazis to the point that even rear-reaming Adolf is hearing horrible stories about the lovely things that the Basterds are doing out there. This is only because every so often the Basterds dare leave one alive to tell the tale... however, the Good Old Jewish Boys make damned sure these Nazi Pants-Wetters can't ever take their uniforms off... due to a specific, hard-to-hide mark. I tell you, it's a laugh riot to watch! Fucking... Nazis! Moving on! It would have been a tempting mistake to make this movie simply about 1001 ways to kill a Nazi Scumbag and like it, however, Quentin Tarantino is not one to fall into easy traps. The Basterds soon find themselves embroiled in a brilliant plot that might just end the war, but still keep them all doing just what they do best. As Tennesssee-bred Aldo says "We in the killin' Nazi business! And cousin... Business is a-boomin'!" If this plan is to succeed, however, they're going to need the help of lots of new players like German-Speaking Brit (and film critic by trade) Lt. Archie Hicox (Michael Fassbender), who was assigned, incidentally by Mike Myers' General Edward Fenech! We also need a turncoat German Actress named Bridget von Hammersmark (Diane Kruger) and a heroic Projectionist named Marcel (Jackie Ido) But first and foremost and lucky for us all... they're going to need Shosanna! Naturally, they're going to need all the help they can get, seeing as how the entire upper echelon of the Third Reich has rallied around a handsome young douchebag named Private Fredrick Zoller (Daniel Bruhl), the closest thing to a "hero" as those pants-load Nazis can get, man! So who can possibly keep all this together for us? Good news, folks, at only the right times, we get a narrator (or "Raconteur") in the form of none other than Samuel L. Jackson! And the Cameos don't end there, folks! Look (and listen) for appearances by Bo Svenson, Julie Dreyfus, Harvey Keitel and even Enzo G. Castellari, director of the similarly titled (and themed) Inglorious Bastards! Yes, there are a good bit of gimmicks employed here, not the least of which are Easter Eggs and Cameos and there are a few slow moments that may bore the less refined audience member. However, these all serve the film, rather than dragging it down. This is because these "gimmicks" are all handled so perfectly by Quentin Tarantino. The film transcends being "good" and becomes "great" not in spite of Tarantino's Self-Indulgence, but because of it. His use of spaghetti western and exploitation motifs feel very unlike most any other World War II flicks. This never tries to be any other flick but Inglourious Basterds (it doesn't even REALLY try to be Inglorious Bastards)... and it does a beautiful job of what it sets out to do. Amazingly, one of the things that Inglourious Basterds does so well is make us laugh. There is no question that Tarantino takes his film and its subject matter seriously, but he never hesitates to make killing and torturing Nasis look like a hell of a great party game. This is a movie about Jewish American Soldiers (and their loyal compatriots) dishing out a ton of punishment to the Third Reich, while some of the very best and brightest of Europe work through some amazing dialogue for a brilliant drama, rife with raucous comedy. Tarantino isn't making The Pianist! He's making the movie for all of those folks who thought The Pianist was good, but would have preferred to see ol Wladyslaw pick up a Machete, walk back into the Concentration Camp and scream "NOT ON MY SHIFT!" before castrating about fifty Swastika-Wearing Turd-Suckers! On that note, it is worth mentioning that this is both a brilliantly paced drama and a gory, extremely violent film (somewhere near the par of Pulp Fiction, but not even close to Kill Bill). That said, we are talking about offing Nazis here and more often than not, this very subject is funny as fuck. "Oh, but that's inhumane!" some folks may say. Okay, then, let's take a look at the current crop of theatrical releases and see how many films out there are about some amoral psychopath chopping up innocent hotties only to be (maybe) stopped in the last reel! Come the hell on... if we're going to have movies like this at all, can't we have the violence aimed at racist pig-dicks, please? Folks, this is a light, family comedy all about Nazis meeting the devil (by aaron pruitt). I, for one, am right there, people... and I am totally and completely all about Aldo the Apache! Fuh-huh-huck YEAH! Yes, Tarantino has done it again and, as always, he's done it in his own indulgent, self-satisfied, brilliant and bad-ass way. He pulls no punches, he tells his stories and somehow critics and fans still line up to see them... especially me. After a decade of anticipation and rearranged dates, Inglourious Basterds gets Four and one half Stars out of Five... Hell, almost the full FIVE, man! It may be more hostile than Hostel, more bloody than Grindhouse and more revenge-focused than Kill Bill... but it's also one of the best written dramas to come out in quite some time. Quentin, you keep doing it your way... I'll plan on playing T-Ball with a few Nazis in the Next Reel!

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Inglourious Basterds (2009) reviewed by J.C. Maçek III
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And for this...
So, you know, NPR produces both ALL THINGS CONSIDERED and
ALL SONGS CONSIDERED?
Well, I had a great idea for a show that I considered to be the natural evolution of both titles that could make us all rich and also be of the quality that is to be expe...cted from NPR.
However, not only did they refuse to produce it, but they filed an injunction to prevent me from ever hosting a show called ALL THONGS CONSIDERED.
Dick move!
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