Inglourious Basterds

Directed by Quentin Tarantino
(2009)

Instinct calls for a diatribe upon the grossly overrated nature of Quentin Tarantino, taking the following potshot: Tarantino is to cinema what Slipknot is to metal - not authentic. But I won't do that. I've learned to accept the director's work for what it is: entertainment. He often attempts to shift into the realm of art, but such is little more than clever dialogue and ultra-violence cloaked in dramatic camerawork. And that's fine. My conscious doesn't require an overhaul with every movie. Sometimes things just need to go boom.

Inglourious Basterds delivers what you'd expect it to. Pronounced wit and superfluous brutality. Brad Pitt cracks a funny and a Nazi gets a swastika carved in his forehead. Justice served. To condense a needless summary that can be found in abundance over at Rotten Tomatoes, you should walk out of the theater entertained. Though I will add that Christoph Waltz gives a breakout performance as the cunning and malicious (and humorous) Colonel Hans Landa, aka "Jew Hunter".

But in comparison to Tarantino's past offerings, Inglourious Basterds lacks. Namely in terms of character depth regarding "The Basterds". This is a shame, considering the opportunity presented by the notion of a Jewish death squad in World War II. We could have had The Dirty Dozen meets The Watchmen. Though some great character ideas are presented, like the baseball bat-wielding Bear Jew, they never flesh out beyond their awkward introductions. Instead, the film's two other storylines eat up the clock, leaving Brad Pitt's brazen doofusness as the only memorable trait of the Bastards. Inglourious Basterds needed the large scope that Kill Bill had, allowing for a number of characters and storylines to develop without any gaps or forced acceleration. This film feels like way too much was left in the editing room.

Alright. I said I wasn't going to be an asshole on this one, but it can't be helped. The premise here is outrageous. Beyond that, it's too easy. Who can the audience justifiably hate the most? Nazis. Who can take the most satisfying revenge on them? Jews. Tarantino is like that whale of a stepfather who spoils the children with expensive gifts in order to win their affection; he might gain their favor, but ignobly so. Again, I know I'm not supposed to access the cerebral with this guy, but it pains me to see him held up as a genius by most (Copernicus was a genius, idiots), when he's really just dressing up cheap conflict in pomp and circumstance. More painful is knowing that Tarantino has an extensive knowledge of cinema and continues to produce this ornamental tom-foolery.

He needs to learn how to spell, too.

I got knocked.

Blogger, Mediafire, and assumedly Barsuk Records gave me a collective "hell no", so I had to pull the link on the new Bazan album. I should have known better, since that's something of a high profile release and I leaked it. (Josh, that was for you...and you couldn't even download it!) There hasn't been an issue until now, so obviously none of the other stuff I've posted here has set off any alarms with artists/labels. So I'm gonna keep providing, just avoiding the leaking of popular shit. I'm also gonna switch the link up so it's not so transparently labeled "download". Don't worry. It won't be hard to find.

The Wire

I know I'm late, but damn this show is good. Best I've seen in quite some time. Well written and grimy as hell. HBO will go down in history for reinventing television.



Wait. Doesn't that foul-mouthed fellow look vaguely familiar? REWIND.



That is just great casting.

WTF

I swear on my mother that I just heard an ice cream truck playing "Silent Night".

David Bazan - Curse Your Branches

Barsuk Records
(2009)

Even as a militant secular humanist, I have always held David Bazan in high esteem. I attribute this fact to his never irrationally doctrinal lyrics. Bazan has always dealt with the less attractive aspects of life, like divorce and suicide, with poignant realism that elicits an inevasible melancholy. Though "God" and "Jesus" have always been occasional invocations, they are never made in praise or supplication, tending to appear in the context of desperate futility. (And he's never been too prudish to refrain from dropping an f-bomb or focusing "his high hopes on a vagina or two.")

Curse Your Branches shows the futility hit a breaking point. While he renounced Christianity around the time of Pedro the Lion's Winners Never Quit, this marks the first record where Bazan can be heard openly criticizing the constituents of his past faith. At a few tracks in, the skepticism could feasibly be interpreted as a mocking of Doubting Thomases. But by the time "When We Fell" plays, all jokes are off: "You knew what would happen and made us just the same. Then you, my Lord, can take the blame."

Lines like these provide me with a sort of personal affirmation, not to mention a giant shit-eating grin. Yet, for Bazan such a conviction brings about severe consequences. A little knowledge of his backstory - being married to a devout Christian intent on raising their daughter in church - reveals a quandary that clearly influences much of the discouragement found on Curse Your Branches. On "Bearing Witness", Bazan dispenses with the old fables and offers his child an invaluable piece of rational thought: "Though it may alienate your family and blur the lines of your identity, let go of what you know and honor what exists. Daughter, that's what bearing witness is."

It's an absurd world. Every time I watch the news or pick the paper, humans are damning and killing one another over discrepancies in archaic belief systems. Each time, a bit of my sanity dissipates - to the point where I start to believe it is actually me who is delusional. It's records like this one that bring me just enough resolve to know I'm not completely marooned. For every Cat Stevens, there is a David Bazan. Well, that's pretty delusional. But maybe one day it won't be.

(May Jeremy Enigk be the next to fall from grace.)

Special Delivery

A new Converge track, "Dark Horse", can be heard here. Good goddamn it's rad. Get stoked for the new album, Axe To Fall, which drops October 10th.

Transcending white trash

So hard.

Shit pending.

School has had me in a vice for the past few weeks. It'll be over after 20th. So I'll have some new goods posted up here in about a week. Until then, enjoy this scene from a screenplay I'm writing that addresses the truth about universal health-care.

PARENT: Oh doctor! How is my child?

DOCTOR: Well, I've got some bad news. It's a retard.

PARENT: Oh no!

DOCTOR: Oh yes. And because your child's panel review showed unacceptable levels of potential societal productivity, we have no option other than to euthanize.

PARENT: Lord have mercy!

DOCTOR: This, of course, means it will be terminated via repeated blows of a heavy wooden stick.

PARENT: (sob)

DOCTOR: Kidding! Lethal injection is protocol.

PARENT: Oh cruel world!

DOCTOR: (walks away and high-fives passing doctor)

Cue Van Halen's "Runnin' with the Devil"

Brutal Truth/Converge - In These Black Days: Vol 2

Hydra Head Records
(1997)

It's pretty hard to technically botch a Black Sabbath cover. Being little more than a dirge of distorted blues chords, they are commonly some of the first songs that novice guitarists of good taste bumble through. So the question then becomes whether to play the songs straight up as tributes or to expand in directions the originals only hinted at. But this provides a set of pratfalls. Sticking too close to the progenitor's style lands you in that reoccurring local-dive bar-scene territory, while taking too many artistic liberties causes the song to collapse from excessive deviation - bad news for a Sabbath track.

In this split between grind kings Brutal Truth and a pre-Jane Doe Converge, a collective attempt to foil this heavy metal conundrum is made. Both bands, to varying degrees, take a middle path between tribute and experimentation with Black Sabbath. For Brutal Truth, this approach acknowledges a momentary shift in their sound, as nary a blastbeat can be found in their cover of the doom-laden "Cornucopia". Though a slight increase in speed and inherent crust of the band help avoid any shameless idol flattery. Yet, it is Converge's take on "Snowblind" which gets the blue-ribbon. Oddly enough, it comes across almost musically identical to the Sabbath version. That is, until Jacob Bannon unleashes his inhuman vocal exorcism upon the once crooned lines of Ozzy, smothering them in a malevolence that the heavy metal of Sabbath's era may have claimed but never actually produced. Perhaps the most remarkable insight to arise here is how comparable the melodies in "Snowblind" are to those found in the earlier, more melodically inclined material of Converge. Even with this unlikely connection drawn, it's still amusing to hear such a definitive hardcore band play what is essentially a rock song, and do it in a way that won't make you cringe.

BOTTOM LINE: Classic bands covering classic songs by another classic band. Do the math.

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