Editor's Note: This article was supposed to go up before Simon had seen the movie but it took longer to scribe than I thought. Keep an eye on the homepage and our Twitter account for his updates now that he has called the film "absolute fucking quality".
I spoke to Simon last night on MSN. He complained about the food over there in Cannes. Not that he thinks it's bad mind you, just that he has been rapidly running out of money to buy it and he claims to have lost almost a stone in just over a week. Concerned, I asked him if he was ok, he told me that the movies had been his fuel and he hadn't much thought about eating out there in truth, he's having the time of his life watching movies all day as his official job. He described today, May 20th, as being Christmas with sunshine. He had already booked a taxi
to come pick him up in the early hours so he could get a front row seat to see
Quentin Tarantino's ten years in the making World War II epic
Inglourious Basterds.
He wanted to catch the movie and feel it before anyone else could. Simon, who decided not
to read the script last summer like everyone else and instead wait until he could see the final film for himself doesn't quite know what to expect. I told him the three favourite scenes that blew me away from the script, one of them being the incredible opening involving a German resident who may or may not have a family of jews hiding from Nazi's in his home. The movie begins with the villain, Col. Hans Landa, one of the greatest screen Nazi's I have ever read. I called him on the day of unknown actor
Christopher Waltz's casting on
30.08.08 "easily the most realised character in the film, one of the smoothest and intriguing villains Ive read in a long time. He reminded me of a cross between Alan Rickman in Die Hard crossed with Sergi Lopezs Captain Vidal from Pans Labyrinth"
It truly is the kind of part that can only come from the mind of a man who has seen so many World War II depictions of Nazi's in the history of cinema. Tarantino has has brought together all the best bits into this one character. He is a more sophisitcated
Lee Van Cleef, but he is written as coldly as any of his characters were. Here is a glimpse of that scene courtesy of
Trailer Addict, which Tarantino has re-tooled a
Ennio Morricone theme from
Kill Bill to reside it too... The other two scenes I told Simon that blew me away, well I don't want to spoil them too much (and quite smartly The Weinsteins have agreed with me by not showing us those scenes) but one of them involves the character of Shosanna (the heart and soul of the movie) in a late scene in the cinema, and the other is a
"guess who I am" game which has been referenced several times in officially released photo's. Loved those scenes.
I also love the ending too
but according to Harry Knowles, he believes some of it has been changed. Enough of me waffling. Here's another clip, which is the most we have seen of
Brad Pitt's character Lt. Aldo Raine. The accent is a re-tooling of his Jesse James but there's a glimpse here to a Brad Pitt we haven't seen this fun or animated since the early part of his career. The one where he was fearless in being "out there", which has started to come back recently, most notably in
Burn After Reading. The final clip,
"The Furher is Attending the Premiere" (love the Leone esque in your face camera angles, but is
Diane Kruger a good actress in this scene. You tell me...) Us minions, can see
Inglourious Basterds in August. Expect to be sick of hearing everyone declare love to this movie in about three days!