Tarantino's hand-written title page of his 'Django Unchained' script.
Quentin Tarantino has described in recent interviews his goal to create companion films that take ugly moments of history and turn them in the style of spaghetti westerns. The first was of course the hugely successful Inglorious Basterds, which rewrote the history of WWII into a revenge film straight out of the wild west. Americans were happy to sit back and watch the good US of A beat the hell out of those Nazi bastards. Something tells me, however, that the general American public will not take so kindly to his follow-up, Django Unchained.
In a nutshell, Unchained tells the story of Django (Jamie Foxx), a slave who is freed and mentored by a German bounty hunter, Dr. King Schultz (Waltz) in order to rescue Django’s wife, Broomhilda (Kerry Washington) from the ruthless slave owner, Calvin Candie (DiCaprio). In true spaghetti style, this is an ultimate tale of revenge. Django escalates to the level of mythic hero by the end, and one can hear the sweeping music even from merely reading scene descriptions. Such is Tarantino’s unparalleled eye for genre convention.
However, Tarantino has made it abundantly clear, both from interviews and the unapologetic brutality of the writing, that he wishes to portray this era in American history as the horror story it so undoubtedly was. To give a better picture of what exactly I mean by this, on any given page of the script, hardly two lines go by without someone using the “N” word. What allows him to get away with the offensive language is of course his unrelenting determination to immerse us in the period. The characters talk like this because…well, that’s how these kinds of people talked (whether we like it or not).
Every member of the cast has their work cut out for them. There is no role in the entire film that will not present risks to the careers of even the most famous of the cast. Indeed, probably the most daring individual involved has to be Leonardo DiCaprio, whose success has always seemed bullet-proof. It will be interesting to see how, or possibly if, he will survive the role of Calvin Candie, who is without a doubt one of the most disgusting villains in film, not just by Tarantino standards.
That said, if anyone is up to the challenge it is without a doubt someone with as much clout as DiCaprio, and it is certainly his performance I anticipate the most. Not to overstate, but I feel confident in saying this will be the greatest departure anyone is likely to see from him in his entire body of work. Not many a man would have the guts to go after a villain like Candie, who represents so much more than himself, indeed, he represents the darkest side of America’s national personality.
Kerry Washington also has a hugely formidable task before her. Apparently, Tarantino wrote the role of Broomhilda with her in mind, but was skeptical that she would accept it due to the amount of nudity called for by the role. Indeed, Broomhilda is rarely clothed at any given point in the script, and contrary to Tarantino’s usual trademark of strong women, Broomhilda is repeatedly made a victim. However, I attribute this complete and utter damsel in distress character to Tarantino’s mission to stay true to the conventions of the spaghetti western. The structure is simple: the hero seeks to rescue his love from the clutches of an evildoer. The complexity lies in the setting he has chosen to place this structure, and the clear desired effect it will have on its audience.
Judging from the script, this is probably going to be Tarantino’s most controversial film to date. He has no desire to appeal to “joe popcorn.” This is a niche genre film disguised by a Hollywood A-list cast, which will inevitably broaden its market. However, any audience member will be able to tell almost immediately who among them knew what they are getting themselves into and those who did not. Almost more than I am for the film itself, I am excited to see the reactions of the nation as we are confronted with our darkest period of history laid out before us in 35mm.
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