Movie Review: 'Django Unchained'

by Brian Kesler

4/5 stars

Tarantino's latest film, 'Django Unchained,' follows a freed slave and his German sidekick as they prowl the southland and shoot, stab, kill, and bloody up arrogant white plantation owners. They do so to the especially nasty slavers. Some of them feed their slaves to ravenous dogs, force them to wear chains, lash them 'til they bleed, and treat slave women as prostitutes. Some of the slaves win favor with the plantation owners and help them carry out their cruel deeds. These men and women, too, are brutally killed by Django and Schultz. It's sort of a Western, except in the South. If the plot sounds like another Tarantino film, 'Inglorious Basterds,' that's because they are the same concept in different historical and racial perspectives.

There's a certain unnerving enjoyment in seeing these slave owners get what they deserve, just as there was an enjoyment in seeing Hitler's body machine-gunned until it was barely recognizable in 'Inglorious Basterds.' This film is not as good as 'Inglorious Basterds.' There was a level of sophistication and unparalleled filmmaking in that movie. 'Basterds' had long stretches of dialogue that triggered suspense, rather than action. The characters in that movie were more interesting, the dialogue unsurpassed, the pace genius, and the plot tight. It was also less violent. Probably not in its visual representation of violence, but in its thematic use of violence, yes. This film has a far more serious and disturbing plot. It gets up close and personal with the real, historical, and painful toils black Americans suffered in the pre-war South. It is therefore, unenlightening - and distracting - when the film resorts to a Hollywood shoot-em-up climax.

This film also follows a cultural trend that concerns me. As I've said in a previous post, violence in film is sometimes necessary and artistic - even in copious amounts - as long as it serves a purpose to the thematic arc of the plot. This film qualifies. But, it's what it has to say about violence that irks me. An ideological tidal wave has struck America in the form of Libertarianism. While there are worthy elements from this ideology, just as with any other, extremism is easy to come by. With all the superhero films, and comic book movies making it big at the box office, there is a trending approval of vigilantism among Americans. Part of that trend are movies, like this one (they seem to be growing in numbers each year) which suggest that revenge is the same as justice. In the film, a certain disgusting character regards himself as a Francophile and, in the nature of his infatuation with all things French, names one of his slaves D'Artagnan, whom he forces to fight-to-the-death with other slaves. After witnessing the Francophile torture and kill this slave, Schultz (the German sidekick) asks him whether he thinks Alexander Dumas would approve naming a slave after one of his characters. Dumas was black, you see. Shultz then proceeds to kill the Francophile and he, himself, ends up dying a hero.

I wonder if Schultz had read another work by Dumas: 'The Count of Monte Cristo.' You see, the trend used to show violence in a different light. 'The Count of Monte Cristo,' like 'Django Unchained,' is about revenge. However, the overall thematic statement Alexander Dumas makes in his masterpiece is that revenge is not the same thing as justice; that the attempt at revenge, or the longing for revenge, will eventually destroy not only your own integrity, but everything you're fighting to protect. It is only recently that our culture has given in to Ayn Rand Objectivism and denied that there is any social contract we have with one another. We have a justice system in place. We have a police force to protect us. Vigilantism and revenge are wrong and go against the very definition of a civilized society.

However, I can't hold this against the film. As a lover of art, it is inappropriate for me to interject my own ideological outlook into the work of an artist, who may express something I disagree with, but - nevertheless - does it well. Tarantino's films all have to do with vengeance in some form, and this film follows the theme. It carries over his wonderful dialogue, his eye for composition, and his unparalleled sense of humor. The plot needs tightening up, the film is overlong, and the climax is disappointing - especially when it revolves around a flat character like Broomhilda - but these faults don't diminish the fact that Tarantino is a filmmaker to be reckoned with.