Tuesday, January 8, 2013

"Django Unchained" Could Have Used More Restraint


 It didn’t help that Newtown happened. It didn’t help that the movie theater shootings in Colorado happened. In the past, I probably would have liked Quentin Tarantino’s new film, “Django Unchained,” a little more than I did, however, with our society able to access more information about the day’s news, hearing about random acts of violence that happen in real life seems to make films with an overuse of violence more and more unwelcome, or at least scenes in such films more and more unwelcome. I have cringed more than once while watching the trailer for the upcoming film, “Gangster Squad,” even the post-Colorado version of that film’s trailer sans gangsters shooting up a theater full of people portion.
Having said all of this, I think “Django Unchained” is a good film, with the exception of about twenty minutes that occur in the film’s third hour.
As in his 2010 film, “Inglorious Basterds,” Tarantino sets up the main characters of the film perfectly. As in “Inglorious Basterds,” Christoph Waltz plays the main character we initially encounter. As in “Inglorious Basterds,” Waltz gives a flawless performance, though in “Django Unchained,” his character is much more likable. Tarantino does not build the same high level of tension in the first reel of “Django” as he did in the first reel of “Basterds,” however, he does prove once again that he certainly knows how to engage the audience in the first reel of his films. Tarantino is an expert storyteller. He sets up who the main characters are going to be and why they are in the situation they are in early on and he is able to keep an audience interested in his films which tend to run around the 150 minute mark, and in the case of “Django,” a film that runs 170 minutes. I love long movies, especially if the filmmakers can hold my interest for the entirety of the running time. Even if for a few minutes my mind wanders,  if a long film is interesting, I enjoy it quite a bit.
 I do not know if it was Tarantino’s intention, but one of the aspects of “Django Unchained” I enjoyed was the spacing out of cast members I was looking forward to seeing. As you watch the opening credits, you know that you will see Jamie Foxx as Django and Christoph Waltz as Dr. King Shultz, a dentist who we learn wants to help Django become a free man and help Django find his wife. The opening credits also reveal that we will see Don Johnson, Leonardo DiCaprio (in a Tarantino film!), Samuel L. Jackson, and Franco Nero (!!), the original Django from the 1966 Italian film. The original Django was not about a slave as is “Django Unchained.” In the 1966 “Django, “ the title character is a man who enters a town overrun by bandits. The original “Django” is a fantastic film. It is available on dvd in it’s original Italian language. You may also enjoy Franco Nero in one of the many other films in which he as appeared such as “Enter the Ninja,” the brilliance of "Shark Hunter," or in Giulio Paradisi’s 1979 film, “The Visitor,” in which Nero has a few scenes in which he plays Jesus. You can’t beat that!
As another additional homage to the original film, Tarantino uses the theme song from the 1966 film in the opening credits. That was a great touch. 
The performances in “Django Unchained” are great. As mentioned, Christoph Waltz gives a wonderful performance. Leonardo DiCaprio is excellent as the plantation and slave owner, Calvin Candie. Kerry Washington is great as Django’s wife, Broomhilda, one of Candie’s slaves. Her elegance does not seem at all out of place for her character. Jamie Foxx is very good as Django. His performance is understated even in the violent scenes. I could sense in the character of Django that he did not particularly enjoy what he must do but he knew that such an outcome is, for the purposes of this story, inevitable.
I have two issues with “Django Unchained.” While I stated that I enjoy films that are 2 ½-3 hours long, in the case of this film, I wish it would have been a bit shorter. I began to feel the length of the film during the third hour. It probably could have been shortened by about ten or fifteen minutes and felt more satisfying, creating a more impactful ending. My other issue is that, though it is expected in a Tarantino film, the overuse of violence in “Django” was more cringe-inducing than exciting. One problem is that you know what you are rooting against before you sit down in your seat in the theater. Slavery is horrible and you know that revenge will be enacted in some way in some fashion during the film. There are not many incidents during the course of the film that are surprising or that make you any angrier as a viewer at a character and start your blood boiling,creating an emotional spark that make you more interested in the film than you might already have been. In other words, Tarantino lays down for you, by the very nature of the subject matter, what you are going to see. Samuel L. Jackson’s character, we discover, is more than we think, however, as played by Jackson, his character, Steven, is more funny than anything else. Steven is intended to be funny, however, as events unfold in the film, we do learn more about Steven.
Though flawed, I did like “Django Unchained,” however, it would not be among a group of films I would want to see again soon. I appreciate Tarantino’s style of filmmaking. He is a brilliant filmmaker who sometimes, can use a bit of restraint. As his films become more and more mainstream and are under consideration for major awards as is this one and was “Inglorious Basterds,” I hope he will be able to use violence in his films as more than a sideshow attraction, as if he is asking us to come inside and watch the guys get the guts shot out of them in slow motion. I am not sickened by this. I just roll my eyes a little bit as it seems he can graduate from this usage of violence. I am not saying he should abandon using violence in his films, but rather, use violence to make stronger points as Sam Peckinpah did in some of his films. Sure, show us the violence, but have better reasons for doing so. Make a political statement, make a statement about the state of our nation, etc. As well, as I stated earlier, violence in the real world has made me feel a bit more resistant to films that contain a high level of violence. Gun violence, in particular, seems to be more prevalent in real life, so films depicting gun violence for no reason other than to titillate whoever may be titillated by extreme violence have become of lesser value to my movie-watching desire. Maybe I am just becoming more prudish. I do not think so, as I know I still enjoy action films and horror films as much as I always have. It is likely just bad timing for me to be as interested in Tarantino’s film or any other film with as much violence as is contained in “Django Unchained" as I once may have been. I enjoyed the film, but with more restraint, it could have been a lot better.

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