It’s not like I didn’t know what to expect.

Just the name Tarantino is usually enough to let you know what you’re in for. His name has practically become an adjective. (“The tarantino effect was in full force as the spatters of red wine reached every corner of the kitchen.”) Since he burst onto the scene in 1992 with the extremely bloody Reservoir Dogs, his films have become synonymous with over-the-top violence. He stays pretty true to form in his latest, Django Unchained.

The movie follows the adventures of a bounty hunter named King Schultz (Christoph Waltz) who teams up with a slave (Jamie Foxx). King buys Django and frees him, and together they hunt down a variety of criminals, all the while looking for Django’s wife, Broomhilde, who was sold to another plantation. Tarantino likes to mix up his styles, so the film pays homage to spaghetti westerns with a number of anachronistic, contemporary touches thrown in as well. I’m not sure if “homage” is the right word here, because to me if seemed like a really violent remake of Blazing Saddles. With the duo of Foxx/Waltz as a stand-in for Cleavon Little and Gene Wilder, the mixed race duo encounter overt racism and over-the-top bad guys. Even the comedy is slapstick, as a group of KKK members ride to lynch Django but have to abort the mission because they can’t see out of the eye holes of their hoods. I would have sworn that the voice coming out of one of the masked Klansman was Slim Pickens, who was in Blazing Saddles but died about 30 years ago. Broomhilde even speaks German, a plot point that figures into her rescue, although at no point is she as tired as Madeline Kahn. Continue reading “Django Unchained” →