Exaggeration alert – Or don’t jump the gun on German film critics

Comedy HitlerThe film isn’t even in the can, it hasn’t even been cast yet, and already there’s a gazillion of websites quoting one (!!) German film critic, or one (!!) article in a respectable German newspaper about how Inglorious Bastards might (!) hurt some feelings among the German public over the film’s likely depiction – and elimination – of Nazis by the hands of Brad Pitt‘s all-Jewish commando unit. The latest bit is in Vulture, and it states, packed in a I have to admit rather stereotypical text, We’re no expert on the German national temperament, but when we watch movies about how Americans were assholes to, say, the Indians or slaves — to choose two somewhat analogous historical situations — we sort of shrug and say, “Well, we deserve that.” As most of you know I am myself German, and not entirely unfamiliar with this topic. I just wanted to say that I find it utterly hilarious that on the basis of a few blurbs, the internets are already going half-apeshit over what might be happening once IB will hit German theaters. I understand Vulture’s point, but seriously, the last few years have seen German movies about Hitler in many variations, no other country probably has churned out more history-digesting and disecting documentary television and I will just claim that German audiences are among the most Tarantino-loving in the world. So should, in a year from now, a few idiot film critics bitch about how Quentin Tarantino choses to depict semi-fictional on-screen Nazis, please…. let them, while the rest of us is having a great time at the movies. Let’s not give this more attention than it deserves. And to answer Vulture’s question, I personally think that Cruise’s Valkyrie will likely create more bitching because a) he’s a scientology goof and b) that story has already been made into a successful German TV movie that is on prime time television almost twice a year….

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Sebastian

Sebastian is the founder and owner of the Tarantino Archives and has been a fan and observer of QT for over two decades now, cherishing his work and the window in the the wider world of cinema his movies have opened up. Inspired as such, he runs the Spaghetti Western Database (SWDb), the Grindhouse Cinema Database (GCDb), Furious Cinema, its German sister Nischenkino and The Robert Rodriguez Archives. He lives in Berlin.

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