Inglourious Basterds [4K Ultra-HD] [2009] [Blu-ray] [Region Free]

Product Information

There's been a lot of discussion about the fact that the new 4K release of Inglourious Basterds is sourced from its 2K digital intermediate, and is not a full 4K rescan of the original 35mm negative. This fact is being parroted mostly be idiot YouTubers as evidence that this is indicative of it being a poor release, but this is nonsense. Everything is an allusion, a pose, in the films of Quentin Tarantino, right down to the font and colors that he uses for his title sequences—even the name of his production company, A Band Apart, which arrogantly asks us to think of him as our generation’s Godard. And how willingly we indulge him says plenty. Tarantino is as much creator as curator, and his overbearing cinephilia appeals to audiences who not only lost it at the movies but can’t seem to live without them: From Reservoir Dogs to his Kill Bill diptych, his films are solipsistic totems to his favorite things, and their effect is often suffocating.

Freddie Zoller’s real historical counterpart is Audie Murphy, our Medal of Honor recipient credited with 240 German kills. Several years later Murphy became a popular movie star and a recruitment Godsend for the U.S. armed forces. Produced as propaganda during wars and as nostalgic distortions between them, war movies are an irreplaceable PR factor for the hero-making industry that keeps war recruits coming.Tarantino’s dialogue throughout is more than just witty, as it also exudes feeling, dread, and risk. How and why people speak to each other, or how and why they chose not to, becomes a panic far more chilling than any display of violence in Inglourious Basterds. Tarantino’s words pop, but no longer do they exist entirely to flatter his audience’s pop know-how, but to illuminate the politics of communication and survival during WWII. Image/Sound

In the end, it's better than the Blu-ray, it's the best version to own. I will be keeping it in my collection, but I just wanted more.

Scores

But the plot is one thing. His directing is the next part of his genius. Although the film lasts more than 2.5 hours, time flies by instantly. And not because the action is dynamic. On the contrary, there are many scenes that are long and viscous, which we watch with bated breath - these are long interrogations between heroes and villains, in particular, behind an apple strudel, as well as a tense scene of a game in a pub, where sometimes you are afraid to move once more ... And staying true to himself and his style of shooting - Tarantino includes a lot of spectacular brawls, fights, stabbing, shootings and with a huge amount of blood! And you must admit that not in every film this technique will work, but in Tarantino's cinema - it works flawlessly every time!

In the early 1940s, a group of US commandos, led by Lieutenant Aldo Raine (Brad Pitt), are marching into Nazi territory to not only kill them, but scalp them. Among them is Sergeant Hugo Stiglitz (Til Schweiger) and Donny Donowitz aka The Bear Jew (Eli Roth), two of the most vicious men in the group. Combing the countryside for Jews in hiding is SS Office Hans Landa aka The Jew Hunter (Christoph Waltz), a seemingly genial but also malevolent man. After killing her family, Hans allows a young woman, Shosanna Dreyfus (Melanie Laurent), to flee. She later makes it to Paris and winds up running a cinema which will soon be showing a Nazi propaganda film, and she intends to get revenge. The Basterds, now allied with British soldiers, including Lieutenant Archie Hicox (Michael Fassbender), as well as German film star Bridget Von Hammersmark (Diane Kruger), infiltrate the premiere of the film to kill the Nazi leaders present, including Hitler. That’s what Quentin Tarantino does with Inglourious Basterds. To define this movie as simply a drama or comedy, the two broadest genres out there, is to mistakenly define a film that was one of the biggest surprises to me in 2009. After hearing about its lukewarm reaction in Cannes and how Tarantino was busy editing it after that festival ended, I wasn’t expecting too much. For that, I am fortunate, because everyone loves being pleasantly surprised, right? Now that Universal Studios is giving Inglourious Basterds a promotion to 4K, it’s a good reason to revisit it! Now, the only thing this set has to offer is a greatly enhanced viewing experience. The 1080p Blu-ray was reference quality in its day, but I found this new 2160p HDR10 and HDR10+ presentation to be simply beautiful - and well worth the upgrade for. However, I can see folks hoping for a more aggressive object-based audio mix and/or a new selection of bonus features being a bit deflated with this release. To that point, I’ll simply argue that the price point to upgrade for image quality only isn’t too severe. And if you've never owned this film, well that just makes the decision a little easier. I’m safely calling this one Highly Recommended. This is a presentation that looks wholesale better than ever before, but does so in a very nuanced, considered wayA Conversation with Rod Taylor– Taylor, who played Winston Churchill in the film, raves about Tarantino and the film as a whole. Inglourious Basterds. As war rages in Europe, a Nazi-scalping squad of American soldiers, known to their enemy as "The Basterds," is on a daring mission to take down the leaders of the Third Reich. Inglourious Basterds is one of Quentin Tarantino's masterpieces, filming it in his own unique style with powerful dialogues, charismatic heroes and villains, an unpredictable plot, carefully selected music (the scene under David Bowie's Cat People is especially good) and shootouts with rivers of blood. Tarantino fans will surely be delighted. As for the rest, it's hard to say. At your discretion.