Monday, January 14, 2013

DJANGO UNCHAINED


Directed by: Quentin Tarantino
Starring: Jamie Foxx, Christoph Waltz, Leonardo DiCaprio
Running time: 165 minutes

This is your typical Quentin Tarantino movie, long run time, quirky dialogue, homage to classical movies, violence and gore. So if you do not want to see blood everywhere (or Jamie Foxx's balls, or perhaps his stand in's balls in which I do not understand the necessity of depicting that on the screen) avoid this film.

Story wise, Django is a homage to Spaghetti Western genre. The title itself remind viewers with the film Django in the 70s, the score reminded of The Good, The Bad and the Ugly and the look is as western as possible.

Jamie Foxx is Django, a slave freed by a German bounty hunter Dr. King Schultz (Christoph Waltz). As to why the bounty hunter must be German I have no idea. Sure, Waltz has once played a psycho Nazi soldier in Inglourious Basterds (2009) and an Austrian descent, but why must be a German? Does his character a homage into something else?

Logic aside, they both become bounty hunter in the time where slavery considered as normal. As always they face people who stood in their way and shootouts ensues. Here is where the violence is 'necessary' and the use of 'n' word can make people who lives in present time and not a fan of hip-hop/rap, cringe. I can understand why Spike Lee hated this film, although it is better for Lee to watch it first then hate it later.

But those so called violence and human degradation in forms of slavery reminded us that once, a society was bad and rotten to the core. Slavery is absurd and does not make any sense, but it is a historical fact that need to be presented as it is to remind us that all men are created equal.

I think the first half of the film is entertaining, but the second half felt as if it is being overextended to fill 165 minutes of duration. It is not as exciting as Inglourious Basterd, but a decent one. The acting is good, although there is nothing new from Christoph Waltz. He acted Schultz almost similar to what he did in Inglourious Basterd. Jamie Foxx is convincing as always and Leonardo DiCaprio seem a little bit wasted here. He could have been more mean.

Funny, smart and violent I don't know why Django made it to this year's best picture contender. Sure it is good, but not amazing. I'd rather have Seven Psychopaths or TIME magazine worst film of 2012; Cloud Atlas (I personally loved this one) to fill the spot in best picture category than this one.

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