DJANGO UNCHAINED

Django Unchained (18)

Director: Quentin Tarantino
Screenplay: Quentin Tarantino
Starring: Jamie Foxx, Leonardo DiCaprio, Christoph Waltz
Life, liberty and the pursuit of vengeance

“Alright”, you’re probably thinking, “what are they up to now?” “On a site devoted to the Horror Cinema and screen writing, they’re now reviewing a bloody Western!” “As if Batman, Dredd, and The Man with the Iron Fists weren’t enough”. Well folks, let me qualify this for you. For a start it IS a Quentin Tarantino film, and this is his love-letter to the exploitation flicks and spaghetti westerns. For another plus point, it’s gory enough to have made the front cover of “Fangoria” magazine and other horror publications and sites in the US. And let’s be honest, most of the people reading this site will be seeing the film, due to its overt links with classic B-movie sub-texts, and the reliable standard of screenplay that QT usually displays.

So … “Django Unchained” riffs off the extraordinary and prolific amount of Spaghetti Westerns produced in the 60’s & 70’s. The film (which Tarantino acknowledges as the prime influence) is unsurprisingly the 1966 Italian film “Django” (and its 30-odd “sequels”!!) with Franco Nero as the laconic gunfighter. Grim & gritty with some disturbingly sadistic moments, and some iconic imagery, it also flirted with the theme of racism. In that case it was the Mexicans that were being victimised. Obviously in “Unchained” Tarantino has concentrated on the slavery trade and the inhumanities that were bestowed on the innocents during the time of the film.

The film starts in 1858, two years ahead of the civil war, but the emerging differences between the South and the North are already embedded. Django (Jamie Foxx) is released from a slavery by Dr King Schultz (Christoph Waltz), who is a bounty-hunter/dentist. Schultz needs him to identify brothers, who have a large bounty on their heads. From this point training and kinship, leads the two to become partners and vow to rescue Django’s wife from Calvin Candie (Leonardo DiCaprio), but they reckon without the loathsome turncoat that is Calvin’s servant, Stephen (Samuel L.Jackson).

Right from the first beat this is a lavish affair, and a pleasing assault on the visual and aural senses. The musical theme to “Django Unchained” is the same as used in the 1966 “Django”, and yet it seems as relevant and appropriate as it did back then (“Django” by Luis Bacalov. Brilliant!) The soundtrack is a combination of epic spaghetti western guitars and 70’s “Blaxploitation” tunes, and well worth checking out, or download (which I believe is what you groovy kids do these days …)

Mainly it’s about the performances and the four leading men have never been better. Christoph Waltz as Schultz follows up his superb performance from “Inglorious Basterds” with a master-class in character acting, creating an endearing persona. To those that level the criticism at the film that all “the white guys are shown as villains”, Waltz proves this wrong. Schultz is possibly the only character in the film that lives by a moral code, recognises the evils of slavery, and cannot live with the cruelty being unrecognised or accounted for. If there was ever an actor that is simply born to get his chops around Tarantino’s chewy dialogue, it is Mr Waltz. Both DiCaprio and Jackson also make their presence felt, with DiCaprio owning the part of the sly and occasionally explosive plantation owner, and Jackson simply oozing slime as the slave who helps subjugate his own kind to earn standing in his masters eyes. Foxx has come in for some criticism around his somewhat laid back style, particularly as the lead character. In my opinion, this is unfounded, and probably due to the fact that the other aforementioned gentleman have (intentionally) “showier” performances. Watch Foxx’s face and outstretched palm when he whips a plantation guard, and stews inwardly when his wife is man-handled. His “light” delivery on some lines, make them work that much better as well, such as the ironic “I like the way you die … Boy”. The “speak-softly-shoot-hard” routine is entirely keeping with the character’s development, and there’s that killer smile at the climax.

Along the four leading man, there are a plethora of famous faces literally doing bit-parts. Zoe Bell (Tarantino’s favourite stunt-lady) appears as a masked Hench-person, as does Tom Savini (!). Don Johnson, Bruce Dern, Jonah Hill, even Tarantino appear in cameos. Best of all is Franco Nero, the original Django from the 1966 film. “The “D” is silent” says Foxx, when asked his name. “I know” says Nero in a deadpan delivery. As you expect from the Q-Man, the screenplay is playful and full of memorable soliloquys and quotes. My favourite being during a gunfight with one character and Django. “I counted six bullets” sneers the villain. “Well, I counted two guns!” says Django pulling out another firearm from his jacket.

It was Tarantino’s objective to produce an “issues movie” but in the style of a crowd-pleasing genre movie, and in this respect he has succeeded. The morality may be over-played and simplistic, but it is accessible and the film is never less than entertaining and sometimes hypnotic.
Oddly enough for Tarantino, and especially given the 165 minute running time, there seems to be less gratuitous violence than “Inglorious Basterds” or “Pulp Fiction”. However, some of the scenes simmer with an undercurrent of brutality, the prime one being when Candie shows the skull of a previous slave and explains his warped theory on slavery. But when the violence comes-a-knocking, you can’t ignore it! The bloody gun fights (especially at the “big house”) are doused in crimson. These aren’t the hand-to-the-chest-AAARGH-ya-got-me gunfights of old. No Siree. In these cases, the cowboys are human blood-bags. When bullets hit, they explode realistically (I would guess … I’m not a forensic expert) and burst in showers of blood from the wounds. Heads explode and limbs are shattered. One scene is reminiscent of the Uma Thurman Vs. The Crazy 88 fight in “Kill Bill” … but with guns. There does seem to have been some snips made to the brutality though. In fact, one slave-fighting scene seems to have been edited quite clumsily to avoid a shocking eye-gouging (which is ironically what put it on the front cover of “Fangoria” … Wah-Wah-Waaaah!). But fans of stylish violence still have plenty to chew over.

Overall, it’s Tarantino in top form again. The film is thrilling, entertaining, and choc-full of great performances. Whether it works wholly successfully as an “issue” movie is down to your good self, but as part of the modern exploitation wave it definitely delivers the goods.
Now if we could just get Tarantino to do a modern update of “The Creature from the Black Lagoon” …