Wow, what a movie. I consider myself a fan of writer/director Quentin Tarantino. I saw Resevoir Dogs pretty early on when it first came out on video (VHS) and then I went saw both Pulp Fiction and Jackie Brown in the theaters. For some reason I still haven’t watched both Kill Bills all the way through (maybe next year) and I never saw Death Proof, and then it took me a while to finally see Inglorious Basterds – but I loved it. And finally after two-and-a-half years I finally saw – and loved – today’s movie, 2012’s Django Unchained.
The story is fairly simple. A German bounty hunter, played by Christoph Waltz, frees a slave, played by Jamie Foxx, to help him track down a certain bounty because he knows that the slave knows what these men with the bounty on their heads look like. I consider this the first act of the movie. During this time, the German (Schultz) and the slave (Django) become close and after learning more about each other, Schultz asks Django to stay on as his partner and together they’ll track down and try to save Django’s wife, who is also a slave.
That’s the basics of this nearly three hour movie, and it took me a lot longer than that to watch all the way through only because I started it this morning and with life getting in the way, finished it around 10:30pm tonight. I don’t care if it took me 5 days to finish this movie I would’ve felt like it just flew by.
I thought this movie was amazing.
Christoph Waltz was so frigging evil in Inglorious Basterds, and here he comes off as so damn likable, yet still with a dangerous side to him. And Jamie Foxx was perfect. Together they made a fantastic duo.
Christoph Waltz has been in two Quentin Tarentino movies. He’s been nominated for an Oscar for both of these roles – and he’s won that Oscar both times. It doesn’t look like he’s in Tarentino’s next movie (The Hateful Eight) but I look forward to them working together again someday, hopefully.
I know that Foxx has received a bunch of awards and nominations for his role Django, but the fact that he was not even nominated for an Oscar to me is a god damn joke.
And Leonardo DiCaprio? Please, the man is fantastic in anything he does. Not even nominated? Silly. The guy was incredible. Did a fantastic job of just being a horrible, horrible person.
Sam Jackson, I’m not going to say he should’ve been nominated, but the way he handled his role, I quickly forgot about it being Sam Jackson in old man make-up and just enjoyed his role – and hated his character.
And let’s not forget to mention Kerry Washington, who I really don’t know a lot of about, but I know people love her – she was perfect.
I also know that Tarentino won the Oscar for best original screenplay, and the movie itself was up for best picture, but the fact that he wasn’t nominated for best director I also find to be just plain wrong. Hell, the way he makes movies – every time he makes one he should be in consideration.
The movie was funny, sad, scary, charming, and horrific – sometimes all at once.
I love how Tarentino uses music, I love his style of directing and editing – and his use of really cartoon-like violence and blood shed. Very B-movie looking, which I assume is exactly what he was looking for.
A few things of note:
- I remember hearing that at some point Will Smith was almost given the role of Django, but he dropped out and all I can say is I am happy he did. I think he could’ve used a role like this to help boost his career, but I’m glad that he didn’t take it and Jamie Foxx did.
- There were a lot of great cameos in this movie. I knew about Jonah Hill and remember hearing about Don Johnson, but I never would’ve thought that I’d come across Luke Duke himself, Tom Wopat. He played the role of the Marshall in the first town Schultz and Django entered together. That made my day.
I know there was a lot of talk about the “n” word being used so much in this movie – and it was used a ton – and it did make me uncomfortable. And to that I say good – it’s SUPPOSED to make me uncomfortable. It represents a shameful time in American history and I’m SUPPOSED to not like hearing it.
But that doesn’t mean I didn’t like this movie. Quite the opposite. I loved it. I thought it was basically Dawesome.
The D is silent.
24 DOWN. 6 TO GO.
