In reference to the Tarantino story link (set up as an email link for some reason):
If there is a problem with Tarantino’s work, the writer points out a couple clear possibilities:
“Tarantino went to Berlin to make the picture, but there’s nothing in it that suggests the writer-director has ever been outside of a movie theatre.”
At times I found Inglorious reaching for something original, then others it came across quite bland. I actually enjoyed the more classical directing approach and the more familiar characters (stereotypical the writer considers them). But then the over-the-top violence would either make me want to laugh or squirm depending on whether or not it was linked to a dramatic or comical moment. Part of that problem is that QT doesn’t seem to know when to shorten a scene down to its essence. The film is 30-45 minutes too long by my estimation, if you wanted to cut out the ambiguities and reduce it to its essence. The length is where QT strayed from ‘classical’ film-making to the more overwrought and overlong style of the ‘important’ (or egotistical) modern directors. The length is in part due to QT probably intending Inglorious to be a spaghetti Western-like homage (Once Upon a Time in the West), which doesn’t work because of the middle.
All that is due to the fact QT has no real sense of who he is as an individual because, in my opinion, he seems to bring no real personal life experience or attitude to the education he received apparently only from cinema. As for the non-linear forms of Reservoir and Pulp, that’s a result of his reading Mr. L as much as anything else, and certainly in literature that is not exactly unique to the writer, either.
“Peary says, but now that his ’90s novelty has worn off he seems like another Hollywood filmmaker who doesn’t care about the real world, and concentrates on “smart-ass dialogue and explosions.”
This seems to be the case because QT seems to have become so enamored with dialogue and cemented himself as somewhat of a grotesque that he doesn’t know where to go to from such scenes. I was laughing during the bar scene in Inglorious which ends the second act, with the British agent meeting the movie star, when suddenly a surprisingly original action sequence erupted. It was so shocking in its near total elimination of interesting characters that I literally spoke aloud in the theater, “What the Hell!?!
And that is the problem with Inglorious, and maybe QT’s works overall based on watching Death Proof, that he seems to have no way to resolve emotional issues without resorting to violence. This is somewhat reflective of Mr. L’s works, but more due to the 70s films and Hong Kong cop flicks which seem to have influenced QT the most (regardless of his fondness for quoting french filmmakers).
If QT wants to truly mature as a filmmaker he might try a purely dramatic film. Or even a Rom-Com which would play to his dialogue strengths.
But I respect any guy who gets a film made no matter how bad that film may be, or even unoriginal or near outright copy because in the end its the expression of an artist - and it’s not easy getting a film produced!