Heavy Tarantino, Mixed Tarantino

SPOILERS AHEAD: YOU'VE BEEN WARNED!

Quentin Tarantino is certainly a love-hate director. I think it is the way in which he plays with violence and tension; the interplay between the buildup, the action, and then the release. At face value, viewers can take this methodology or leave it. The stylized screenplay and violence that provide such a form can be seen as distasteful to some and completely awesome to others. I also feel that the more weight this form carries due to some other element, the more likely opinions on both sides of the fence will be emphasized. What I mean by more weight is the significance of who is performing the violent act and who is receiving it. So, when looking at Tarantino's body of work (save Jackie Brown and his grindhouse film), we can see a transition of circumstance and setting that change the way Tarantino's form is expressed, one that depicts the tension and violence in, to a very large extent, a new light.

Film is all about reproductions of our world through a certain lens (pun intended) of ideology and emotional tone. It is the framework in which the characters move within that are based on these guidelines given by the filmmaker's motivation. For Tarantino, who is driven by homage more than anything else, his guidelines are the source material of his inspiration. Pulp Fiction stems from pulp novels, Kill Bill from Japanese samurai films, Inglorious Basterds from the Holocaust, and Django Unchained from the period preceding the Civil War in an American with slavery. Now, one can easily see a difference between the first two and the last two. The latter two are based off historical events and not just and sort of event but and event where unflinching dehumanization was involved. Here are four examples of reproductions through a specific lens, a Tarantino lens, if you will.

Now, the crucial thing to look at is the relationship these frameworks play in the form Tarantino employs and its lasting result, as it is measurably different when the framework is an artifact of a dark area of history. Consider Pulp Fiction, Tarantino constructs a world that only exists within itself. As with pulp magazines, its world starts at the beginning of the film and ends at the end (from cover to cover) and governed by episodic scenes of sensational situations. The characters embody such a sensational world, a world where morality does not govern but rather is something inferior to the action we are witnessing. One could say that it is a constructed world of amorality. Of course, before I go further, that is not to say that the film is without moral weight. A viewer is mostly likely to feel unease during many parts of the film. In fact, I would assume the experience to be had in any Tarantino film will be one with strong emotion, that is a foundation of sensationalism. Nevertheless, this sensationalism is more of a focal point than moral themes and moral function. Save maybe Jules revelation at the end of the film and the escapades with Marsellus and Butch, do you think Pulp Fiction functions as a moral tale? As a whole, I think not, and it's because of this that the form carries only the weight it deserves, which isn't hinged upon and predetermined morality that the source material has offered.

Now consider Django Unchained, where the source material is not from pulp magazines but of American slavery in the 1850s. Here, a morality has already been laid out by popular perception, shaping the view we have on perceived individuals like the slave and the slave owner. Moreover, the perception of racial inequality adds even more moral weight to who is saying what and who is performing what act on someone else. Sensationalism is applied, but it is applied in a world that is based off an emotionally tumultuous time period (well, as if there isn't a time period lacking tumult...). Of course, there is more to the source material than just this historical background. The homages range from Peckinpah, Blazing Saddles to spaghetti westerns and blaxploitation films. Yet, these are simply stylistic elements; the historical background works as a thematic element as well as a moral element.

When Jules in Pulp Fiction shoots Brett for Marsellus's brief case, is there any notion of racial motivation or significance? There certainly can be, but I don't think Tarantino wanted that simply because the world created does not care for it. Now, when Django shoots down the Brittle Brothers, is there a notion of racial motivation or significance? Sorry, I severely begged the question there. Of course there is, but there's much more. Slavery has its moral weight driven by the dichotomy of slave and slave owner. And, in this case, race becomes a factor in this dichotomy. In addition, when the roles of this dichotomy are reversed as in the film, the morals still hold, but they are also inverted. The violence in Django must be explored more deeply than in Pulp Fiction because of what has already been set up for us. Tarantino's form as seen through a different lens and is projected with dynamics that carry far more significance.

The same can be said for Inglorious Basterds. One would initially believe there should not be such significance given the clear black and white dichotomy, Jews and Nazis. Yet, the function of the Jews enacting just as sadistic and vicious violence on the once-perpetrator of this same violence questions the roles of each group. Yes, in both narratives, it is a wish-fulfilling scenario created by Tarantino, but it is still his form of stylized, sensational violence and dialogue. Are we really capable of regarding the violence seen in Pulp Fiction the same way we regard it in his last two films? There is certainly a more intense focus with what we view in the films with strong historical backgrounds which can make the events that unfold onscreen scarier, uglier, and, yes, funnier. I will unabashedly attest to the reactions I heard from the screening I went to (Django) that there were proud laughs as many of the slave owners met their demise. Nevertheless, tension in the latest two films is not just tension made by what is happening in the moment but has already happened and what has already been perceived. Scenes are made more dangerous when there is now Hitler or a slave owner involved because of what they imply.

Most of this is probably stating the obvious, but now I will add some of my personal assessments to my recent viewing of Django Unchained based off these observations. First off, I did like the film. It was well-crafted and paced very well for a nearly three-hour film. The acting was, as usual, infectious. In regards to tension, Tarantino is a master of stretching out scenes to the point of unbearable cruelty with the payoff of a cathartic bloodbath and Django is no exception. Yet, I found myself not enjoying as much as I thought. Strangely, I don't mean this in a negative tone. It might be the case that Tarantino does a near perfect job at formulating a string of situations that we witness into a summation rendering the most anxious-ridden moment possible. He meshes his historical setting with his renowned nuance of filmmaking to create an incredibly brutal film. Personally, so brutal that much of the comedy (that I did notice, mind you) presented only adds to my nervousness of the scene at hand. When Candie recites a pwoerful monologue of the 'dimples' and what transpires after becomes inflated with mental and physical tension that any comedic payoff only seemed like one more strand of hay on the camels back that will crush the poor animal. In fact, that is what happens essentially to the character of Schultz and it is that eventual breakdown that gets him killed. Yet, as Billy Goodykootz states in his review, this intense film drenched in the blood and guts of both slave and slave owner comes to an ending visually simple but significantly obscure. For me, there was no catharsis as Django and his wife ride off into the horizon. Again, I realize the wish-fulfilling foundation of the narrative and I know of Tarantino's stylistic characteristics but with a topic this heavy and of how many of the scenes played out, I left the theatre with much of the tension that was built beforehand. Tarantino's form carried far more weight than I even thought, even knowing what this film would be like after seeing his previous film in Basterds. The historical framework Tarantino laid out for this film leaves a lot of space for speculation as to what I should feel towards what transpired. Is ambiguity what Tarantino was going for? Maybe, but I wasn't convinced.

So I will state briefly that while Django Unchained is certainly a great and powerful film, it is also, to me, far more brutal than I wanted it to be to the point where I could never enjoy it as much as a film like Kill Bill, Pulp Fiction, and even Reservoir Dogs, where their worlds reproduced are not worlds that morality provides the foundations or is even a crucial component. Under all the flash, there is a void of emotional confusion I feel when what I dissect on the screen doesn't fully equate with itself.

Another reviewer comment on the fact that despite how tight and original Tarantino is, at some point he comes off as predictable. It is, very much so. To a large extent, that is okay, especially from a marketing standpoint. But, I would like to see Tarantino regard these flipped notions of violence within a traditional dichotomy like Jew and Nazi or slave and slave owner where he regards the weight such violence brings not just as a sensation but of something that can match the topics he is tackling. That's his choice, though.