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View Full Version : The Hateful Eight (Quentin Tarantino)



Henry Gale
12-21-2015, 07:10 AM
IMDb (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt3460252/) / Wiki (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Hateful_Eight)

http://p1cdn02.thewrap.com/images/2014/07/Hateful-Eight-poster.jpg

Henry Gale
12-21-2015, 07:22 AM
This, despite its surface-level structural simplicity, is a lot to wrap my head around, so the only way I feel like going about starting a conversation about it right now is to submit my ranking with an initial gut-feeling as to where it lands in his filmography for me:


Jackie Brown
Inglourious Basterds
Kill Bill
Pulp Fiction
The Hateful Eight
Reservoir Dogs
Django Unchained
Death Proof


Also, the fact that I could make a ranking of the performances where Bruce Dernnn likely lands near the bottom shows just how fucking good everyone is in this.

ledfloyd
12-22-2015, 04:35 PM
Matt Zoller Seitz's review of this one has me kind of dreading it.

Dead & Messed Up
12-22-2015, 04:48 PM
Matt Zoller Seitz's review of this one has me kind of dreading it.

His review isn't far off, but I think the film has sufficiently compelling character cores and arcs to make up for its excesses (both in terms of length and propriety), even if it's probably my least favorite Tarantino film - the flick's basically Reservoir Dogs but with that extra hour Reservoir Dogs didn't need. Seitz also doesn't say much on Walton Goggins' character, who captures a lot of interest as the story goes on.

Acapelli
12-25-2015, 11:06 PM
Walton goggins ruled in this

Dukefrukem
12-27-2015, 03:31 AM
Damn near perfect. Tension builds right from the start.
Couple of small quips; I didn't like the Quentin Tarantino narration. I thought that was kind of lazy out of left field. Thrown in only as humor/comic relief. It wasn't needed as a plot point.

Bruce Dern nails it.
Tim Roth nails it.
Kurt Russell nails it.
Walton Goggins nails it.
Jennifer Jason Leigh nails it.

Michael Madsen... was underused. And I thought maybe there could be a bit more to his character. I also thought he was playing the same character from Reservoir Dogs.

But hot damn does Samuel L. Jackson steal this. His dialog was masterful.

Watashi
12-27-2015, 03:59 AM
Probably my favorite Tarantino after Basterds. I could have spend at least 6 hours with these characters.

Scar
12-27-2015, 04:30 AM
It did not feel like three hours.

Dukefrukem
12-27-2015, 01:55 PM
Pulp Fiction
The Hateful Eight
Kill Bill
Inglourious Basterds
Reservoir Dogs
Death Proof
Django Unchained
Jackie Brown

Watashi
12-27-2015, 07:01 PM
Also as for the violence and sadism, it's not as bad as any episode of Game of Thrones. Maybe I'm just desensitized?

Dukefrukem
12-27-2015, 07:05 PM
Also as for the violence and sadism, it's not as bad as any episode of Game of Thrones. Maybe I'm just desensitized?

My initial reaction was this was his bloodiest/most violent film. Very gross in some scenes.

Scar
12-27-2015, 07:40 PM
Bloodier than Kill Bill? I know I'm desensitized, but come on.

Dukefrukem
12-27-2015, 07:43 PM
Bloodier than Kill Bill? I know I'm desensitized, but come on.

Way bloodier. Kill Bill was campy over-the-top stuff. Hateful Eight gritty gratuitous shit.

Scar
12-27-2015, 08:15 PM
Way bloodier. Kill Bill was campy over-the-top stuff. Hateful Eight gritty gratuitous shit.

Eh. I laughed. I felt Django was far bloodier, granted I was laughing there, too.

Irish
12-28-2015, 02:55 AM
This was Tarantino at his most self indulgent, with the loosest structure and the lamest writing he's presented yet. It really made me wish (yet again) that he and Roger Avery never fell out. QT needs somebody around to tap him on the shoulder and say, "No, Quentin, that's a bad idea."

There's lots of problems around, and I'm not talking about the politics of the thing. Biggest, for me: There's no suspense, and not one of these characters is the least bit interesting.

I could have spent an entire day riding around with Jules and Vincent, listening to them talk about Dutch cops, the holiest of holies, and five dollar shakes. Likewise, mostly, for every character in almost every other Tarantino movie.

The people in H8, by contrast, never say a damn thing that's worth listening to. So in addition to a studiously dull, cut rate version of And Then There Were None, we're deprived of the good rhythms, sing-song dialogue, and Tarantino's usual pace.

A disappointment, because usually with Tarantino even if I don't like the overall film (Basterds, Django) there's at least a piece of it that gets to me, or a performance I can hang onto. Here, there is nothing. Even highly watchable actors like Kurt Russell and Walter Goggins are rendered inert by Tarantino's scenes.

PS: Doubly weird are the critics who are calling this hyper-violent. It makes me think that they (1) don't watch many modern horror movies and (2) they've not seen any recent genre stuff out of Asia. Seriously? Let Us Prey? I Saw the Devil? The Raid? Hello, McFly?!

Dead & Messed Up
12-28-2015, 04:00 AM
This was Tarantino at his most self indulgent, with the loosest structure and the lamest writing he's presented yet. It really made me wish (yet again) that he and Roger Avery never fell out. QT needs somebody around to tap him on the shoulder and say, "No, Quentin, that's a bad idea."

There's lots of problems around, and I'm not talking about the politics of the thing. Biggest, for me: There's no suspense, and not one of these characters is the least bit interesting.

I could have spent an entire day riding around with Jules and Vincent, listening to them talk about Dutch cops, the holiest of holies, and five dollar shakes. Likewise, mostly, for every character in almost every other Tarantino movie.

The people in H8, by contrast, never say a damn thing that's worth listening to. So in addition to a studiously dull, cut rate version of And Then There Were None, we're deprived of the good rhythms, sing-song dialogue, and Tarantino's usual pace.

I found it suspenseful in spots, but otherwise I agree with much of this.

ciaoelor
12-30-2015, 02:27 AM
What the hell is QT's 10th film gonna be like? Not just any old collage, I hope. I mean if he really intends to end at 10, then he's gotta go out with a bang, right?

I'd love for him to make a silent film. Not an homage, but a movie that communicates purely through images. Shot in IMAX!

Whatever it is, it should definitely feel like a celebration, and a bittersweet farewell.

Perhaps it'll be a satire of Hollywood, where Black artists come together to take over White productions, by literally any bloody means necessary.

Ezee E
12-30-2015, 04:55 AM
A masterful first half that doesn't satisfy its tension when all is revealed afterwards. I need to ponder on it, but I kind of just don't like the second half, especially its last 15-20 minutes which is kind of horrible across the board, something I've never said about a Tarantino movie. I'm going to need to think about it a little longer to articulate it.

I did like the roadshow approach though. Overture, the booklet I got, the bathroom break... I kind of hope there's more types of movies like that in the future.

Skitch
12-30-2015, 12:14 PM
The 70mm was gorgeous and the score was incredible. I don't care how many emails he sent begging for the job, Channing was a sore thumb of casting. He did fine, but it felt odd. While they were beautiful to look at, I don't need 15 masturbatory establishing shots every time a stage coach is doing anything. Middle of the pack Tarantino for me, but thats still upper echelon cinema all around.

Did anyone else notice all the houses and fences in the background every time they were outside? Felt like a pretty populated area. :D /nitpick

ciaoelor
12-30-2015, 01:15 PM
The 70mm was gorgeous and the score was incredible. I don't care how many emails he sent begging for the job, Channing was a sore thumb of casting. He did fine, but it felt odd.

A woman with her boyfriend gasped so loudly when he started speaking French.

Ezee E
12-30-2015, 02:51 PM
So, I've decided that the payoff at the end just isn't earned or justified. Daisy's character never actually does anything evil (that we see) in this movie, that makes her long murder seem interesting, funny, justified anything really. In fact, I'm not quite sure how we're suppose to feel. The whole second half gives answers to the image that they present in the first half, but it's not really that interesting. The group that live in the house are so fabricated "happy" and silly that I had no care that they were gone. "Oui," chess matches, and a completely clueless Zoe Bell jumping around for joy when strangers come into the household... Come on.

This is a bummer, because I really enjoyed everything the tension and presentation of the first half. If there's ANYTHING I can say positive about the second half is Bruce Dern's performance will only improve the second time around. He basically does exactly as he's told, until he's pushed to an extreme.

Ezee E
12-30-2015, 02:53 PM
**** -
Pulp Fiction
Jackie Brown
Kill Bill
Inglorious Basterds
Django Unchained

***
Reservoir Dogs

** 1/2
Hateful Eight

**
Death Proof

Pop Trash
12-30-2015, 05:12 PM
Death Proof improved for me the second time around. It might still be his 'worst' movie (haven't seen H8 yet), but the flaws (the indulgent/unbelievable conversations the women characters have) receded a bit.

Watashi
12-30-2015, 06:02 PM
No idea how someone could hate Death Proof. It's masterful.

Ezee E
12-30-2015, 06:23 PM
It's simply boring to me with extended conversations that are just conversations, rather than the Travolta/Jackson lead to a kill. I never found anything thrilling about the stunt at the end, and thought it was pretty obvious what would happen the whole second half.

What's masterful about it?

number8
12-30-2015, 10:45 PM
The dialogue here is nowhere near as tight as his previous works. Some of the Tarantino rhythm that he perfected in Basterds and carried Django seem diluted here. There are parts where he's kinda channeling Sorkin's rhythm instead (which isn't that surprising, maybe, given how much of a fanboy QT has been of him lately).

What's interesting to me is that this is probably the most I've ever been engaged in a Tarantino plot. Usually I just accept them as a transparent carrier for his dialogue scenes and characters. Here, he's wantonly using a device that I'm a huge sucker for that I think screenwriters should really use more often—which is the fake character development. It's what I love the most about spy stories like The Americans, when you watch a convincing and affecting scene between two people that's meant to play to the audience sincerely but you're supposed to also intellectually recognize that it's pure deception. I don't think Tarantino does this as well, but I did really love the fact that we spend the first two hours of this movie learning all sorts of things about the characters that are most likely bullshit, including the centerpiece Big Black Dingus soliloquy. I had the biggest smile on my face when it's revealed that Tim Roth's character's Queen's English is a put on and he busts out a Cockney accent. Just delightful.

Side note: This has the most perfectly placed intermission I've ever seen.

Milky Joe
12-30-2015, 11:26 PM
The subtle change in Tim Roth's face when he goes from "eccentric, friendly British man" to "total fucking psychopath" was amazing.

Skitch
12-31-2015, 02:02 AM
No idea how someone could hate Death Proof. It's masterful.

Its really damn good. A true grindhouse film.

Skitch
12-31-2015, 02:07 AM
I had the biggest smile on my face when it's revealed that Tim Roth's character's Queen's English is a put on and he busts out a Cockney accent. Just delightful.


Possibly my favorite moment. I was giddy to see Roth again in a QT flick, and when he began speaking the Queens at his intro I audibly sighed with sadness. Then the reveal, I was giddy.

Mal
12-31-2015, 02:59 AM
I'd deem this an overlong piece of shit if it wasn't for Samuel L. Jackson's brilliance.

TGM
12-31-2015, 05:57 AM
I may need to let this sit a bit, but my initial reaction is that, while not a bad movie, this may be one of Tarantino's weakest yet. And while I can't say that it was ever boring or anything like that, it still certainly doesn't earn its epic runtime, and honestly comes across more like a writer in desperate need of an editor, not unlike reading one of George R.R. Martin's Game of Thrones novels. And I'll echo the sentiment regarding Tarantino's random narration, which in addition to being quite jarring and out of place, also came across more as laziness than anything else. As far as rankings go...

Inglourious Basterds
Kill Bill
Reservoir Dogs
Pulp Fiction
Django Unchained
Jackie Brown
The Hateful Eight
Death Proof

At least, that's how it stands now. Though, given its similarities to Reservoir Dogs, which over time grew on me quite a bit, who knows, maybe this one will similarly grow on me as well.

Ezee E
12-31-2015, 08:56 PM
Didn't mind the narration, but seems like he could've gone with a better voice instead of his own.

dreamdead
01-01-2016, 11:04 AM
This was the first time that a Tarantino film felt like it wasn't anchored to larger, interesting themes. While there's a surface pleasure in seeing a bunch of characters verbally spar in a closed environment, a lot of the tension fails because it's hard to care about any of them. Toward chapter four and five, Coggins and Jackson finally establish an enjoyable camaraderie, but the post-intermission narrative backtracking seemed tasteless in some of the executions and, again, beyond establishing the murder of innocence and how little some of the characters care for those caught in the margins, there's little reward emotionally.

It's impeccably acted by Leigh, Jackson, and Coggins particularly, but it seems far more interested in itself than in providing any reason why we should care. In terms of representing an amoral lot of characters, that could be intentional, but the biggest spark was when Russell felt betrayed by Jackson's letter.

ledfloyd
01-03-2016, 12:11 AM
This was the first time that a Tarantino film felt like it wasn't anchored to larger, interesting themes.
And this really makes the intense focus on the violence in the last chapter feel hollow.

This isn't a novel observation, but I feel like current day Quentin wouldn't have panned away from Madsen cutting off the cop's ear in Reservoir dogs.

I've found something to appreciate in every one of his previous films. This just feels like an empty, overlong exercise that is way too impressed with itself. Also, is it just me, or is Quentin's ear for dialogue not as sharp as it used to be?

1. Jackie Brown
2. Inglorious Basterds
3. Kill Bill
4. Pulp Fiction
5. Death Proof
6. Reservoir Dogs
7. Django Unchained
8. Hateful Eight

Scar
01-03-2016, 02:26 AM
He panned away because the prosthetic didn't look right.

Skitch
01-03-2016, 01:42 PM
1. Kill Bill
2. Inglorious Basterds
3. Jackie Brown / Reservoir Dogs
5. Death Proof
6. Django Unchained / The Hateful Eight
8. Pulp Fiction

All would at least get a 7/10.

Henry Gale
01-03-2016, 09:01 PM
Seeing it a second time last week, this time in 70mm, with the Overture, the (perfectly placed) Intermission, the longer, unbroken takes, but only one additional scene I can really recall (John Ruth telling Bob to pluck the chicken), I feel like I enjoyed it all even more weirdly enough. I figured the tension of it would be lost because I knew what everyone's true identities, motives and fates were going in, but similar to my subsequent viewings of the basement bar scene in Basterds, it made things even more heightened and pulse-pounding.

My heart was beating through the whole Jackson / Dern scene this time. Especially because it's even more transparently clear what Warren is accomplishing from the get-go. The second of his three big lies. Not sure if it was in the non-roadshow cut, but Goggins' character outrigh shouting at Dern that Warren is just trying to get him to shoot him plays even more disorientingly when inter-cut with Jackson's story continuing with the images. With the, "Starting to see pictures, aint'cha?" the perfect summation of what Tarantino sees his job as with stirring the emotions of the audience with the film at large.

The film is just a simple - though not compact - story about the lies society perpetuates and its people tell themselves to survive, which in the course of this one, long nice, are ultimately are all seen through to result in unravelled chaos. On first viewing I found it cute how it makes such overt auditory and visual cues to The Thing (the score, Russell's casting, the visual of who's left at the end), but on second viewing it became a little more haunting when you start to think what Quentin was trying to do with that. And then I saw Devin Faraci sum it all up with one perfect headline to his review: "The Hateful Eight: America’s Original Sin As 'The Thing'"



1. Jackie Brown
2. Inglorious Basterds
3. Kill Bill
4. Pulp Fiction
5. Death Proof
6. Reservoir Dogs
7. Django Unchained
8. Hateful Eight

See, this really is my ranking too, except I have Death Proof (which I recently realized I've only ever watched the Grindhouse cut of..) swapped with Hateful. I genuinely feel like it'll be appreciated more over time when it's no longer his most recent piece of work. The opposite of what I think is happening for me with Django (which I still really love at least the first 3/4 of).

My one major hangup with this film is that Chapter Five feels pretty unnecessary, as it's mostly a handsome fill-in-the-blanks piece of exposition (and I do find it difficult to complain about him fitting in even more incredible 70mm images of carriages on snowy vistas into the film when it feels like that window of opportunity had long passed), but also it breaks up the flow of the building action in the haberdashery in a really awkward way. The chapter just doesn't feel as electrifying or deeply inspired in the way other chronology-breaking Tarantino chapters have in the past. Think of the way Kill Bill Vol. 2's opening church piece quickly, stunningly informed everything we hadn't known about Bill and The Bride's relationship to that point. In The Four Passengers, we essentially just see what Jackson and Goggins (and the audience) have mostly already surmised out loud.

If he deleted it entirely, it would've been that cool, never-released scene that everyone thinks they'd die to see, but really just works better in everyone's minds as a myth, much like the assurance of how its events might've transpired in the minds of Warren and Mannix.

number8
01-03-2016, 09:23 PM
I agree that narratively the chapter is superfluous. I enjoy the chapter more for its content than its function (like the aforementioned reveals of Roth and Bichir playing up their own stereotypes). But I do remember joking after the movie, "I didn't expect a movie about 8 dudes and a woman stuck in a cabin to pass the Bechdel Test."

Ezee E
01-03-2016, 09:27 PM
What else is deleted in the roadshow versus the shortened version? Or is the intermission the biggest extension of it all?

Henry Gale
01-03-2016, 09:55 PM
What else is deleted in the roadshow versus the shortened version? Or is the intermission the biggest extension of it all?

Well the Overture is 3 minutes and the Intermission is 12, which leaves 5 more minutes in between their length differences.

Aside from being pretty sure the whole chicken plucking bit I mentioned (and likely its corresponding piece in Chapter Five) and a retro Weinstein Company logo both definitely being exclusive the the roadshow edition, my only clues to where the rest of the runtime came from internal reactions like, "Did this shot last this long before?", "Hmm, I don't remember that line in the other one.", and "I'm pretty sure this cut away to shot-reverse-shot close-ups in the other version." when it lingered on wide ones of multiple characters.

I just hope they're both released on Blu-ray together, not just so that we're spared another Grindhouse situation of waiting years for one version or another to get released, but just so sites like Movie Censorship (http://www.movie-censorship.com/) can go frame by frame and detail what's different.

ledfloyd
01-04-2016, 12:38 AM
If he deleted it entirely, it would've been that cool, never-released scene that everyone thinks they'd die to see, but really just works better in everyone's minds as a myth, much like the assurance of how its events might've transpired in the minds of Warren and Mannix.
Speaking of, I'm still dying to see the Maggie Cheung footage from Inglorious Basterds.

number8
01-04-2016, 12:54 AM
According to Tarantino, it is mostly just prolonging the wide shots. I believe the 70mm version holds the shot longer on Jennifer Jason Leigh playing guitar, and Parks and Goggins staking the snow, etc.

Skitch
01-04-2016, 01:18 AM
According to Tarantino, it is mostly just prolonging the wide shots.
Good, because that was all that needed trimmed, imo.

number8
01-04-2016, 01:32 AM
His words:


[The long takes] was awesome in the bigness of 70, but sitting on your couch, maybe it’s not so awesome. So I cut it up a little bit. It’s a little less precious about itself.

Milky Joe
01-04-2016, 01:58 AM
Puzzled by the somewhat poor response to this, honestly (below Death Proof, really?), but I think that's a sign that it will grow in time to be appreciated as one of QT's finest achievements. Everybody hated The Shining when it came out, too. Outside of a few scenes, Django was a crowd-pleaser (hence the favorable reviews); this, however, was an absolutely harrowing experience that cannot be grokked in one viewing.

It's a nasty piece of business, but necessarily so.

ledfloyd
01-04-2016, 02:52 AM
At least Death Proof is a cool experiment in audience identification (and that car chase is one of the best ever). This is just... nothing.

Ezee E
01-04-2016, 03:15 AM
His words:

Ha. The stalk in the snow was one of my favorite spots in the movie with the combination of the music. Entirely overthetop, but I dug it.

Milky Joe
01-04-2016, 04:26 AM
At least Death Proof is a cool experiment in audience identification (and that car chase is one of the best ever). This is just... nothing.

Nothing? Are you sure you weren't sitting in the wrong theater for three hours? It seemed a whole hell of a lot of something to me.

transmogrifier
01-04-2016, 09:14 AM
It's about time we had a truly polarizing movie. Can't wait to see it.

D_Davis
01-04-2016, 03:54 PM
This was the first time that a Tarantino film felt like it wasn't anchored to larger, interesting themes.

Huh. Interesting. I felt like this was the first time that a Tarantino film was anchored to larger, more interesting themes, beyond genre and meta-cinema. It really is his only directly political film - it is very much a reaction to the current American socio-political climate. For the first time ever it feels as though Tarantino is reacting to modern reality, rather than riffing on some fictional cinematic reality of his past. It is not nostalgic, and not just his take on a spaghetti western, which is one of the reasons why Morriconi agreed to do the score.

I liked it a lot, but I didn't love it. Solidly middle-tier Tarantino. Which is still better than most other movies I see these days.

I also felt like it was his most angry, violent, and mean spirited film. It's absolutely fucking nasty in places. But again, I don't think this was superfluous or gratuitous. To me it feels like a very angry and nasty reaction to the angry and nasty times we are currently living in.

ledfloyd
01-04-2016, 04:20 PM
I also felt like it was his most angry, violent, and mean spirited film. It's absolutely fucking nasty in places. But again, I don't think this was superfluous or gratuitous. To me it feels like a very angry and nasty reaction to the angry and nasty times we are currently living in.
See, I felt that it was kind of gratuitous. I think part of it is that his thesis is kind of underdeveloped, which could be because this is his first time making a political film.

Like what was the point of having Walton Goggins entertain Daisy's invitation to collaborate? It just prolonged her suffering. The film feels sadistic in places. And it isn't justified like it was in Django and Basterds because we're never given a sense of the atrocities this gang carried out.

There are other little throwaway things that seem kind of silly. Like why divide the bar into Philadelphia and Georgia if that's never going to be followed up on. It's a stupid, showy way of saying, "See, it's like Minnie's Haberdashery is a microcosm of postwar America, you know!?" which was already pretty clear.

Also, it's already been mentioned that the chapter introducing Channing Tatum was more or less unnecessary. But why spend time introducing characters who are so clearly — given what we've seen so far — cannon fodder? Is there anything at all gained from that sequence? I'm willing to hear arguments.

I also don't understand what the point is. Like I get that he's commenting on extra-judicial killings and race relations, but to what end? It devolves into an orgy of violence and no point is ever made.

Also, the big black pecker monologue was unsettling (and I get that it was supposed to be) because you can almost see Quentin gleefully smiling as he's writing it. Almost as if he's thinking, "look what I can get away with here because I have a black leading man!"

Not to mention Jennifer Jason Leigh serving more or less as a punching bag during the first half of the film almost exclusively for comic relief.

ETA: Just to clarify. I don't think the film is misogynist or racist, as some have claimed. I just don't think Quentin understands politics and history nearly as well as he understands movies, so the themes are half-assed and this stuff sticks out. It's more stupidity and ignorance than malice.

ETAA: And this is all in addition to the fact that the film feels overlong and lacks the rhythms and snappy dialogue most of us come to Tarantino films for in the first place.

D_Davis
01-04-2016, 04:29 PM
I just don't think Quentin understands politics and history nearly as well as he understands movies, so the themes are half-assed and this stuff sticks out. It's more stupidity and ignorance than malice.


I agree - which is why it's not top-tier for me. It could have, and should have, been even better.

But then again, ranking his films is almost impossible for me to do, because I like every single one to some degree, and the order becomes almost entirely meaningless.

Milky Joe
01-04-2016, 09:14 PM
The race-relations thing seems like a red herring; the misogyny is the grander point. White men and black men hate each other's guts... but they'll put aside their differences when it comes to "giving this bitch what she deserves." It's the Elephant in the Room.

My girlfriend, who is easily the hardcorest feminist I've ever met, got up and walked out of the theater in the final scene as they were stringing Daisy up (she came back for the final moments). She said the "punitive glee" with which the film treated Daisy was disturbing and sickening, and she just didn't "get" the movie, or what the point was supposed to be. Is Tarantino just trying to piss women off, or get women angry/riled up?

Then, a couple days later, after considering it, she says, "I want to see it again."

That's a remarkable achievement, IMO.

number8
01-04-2016, 10:00 PM
I don't think it's a red herring, I think it works hand in hand with the misogyny to support the larger theme. It's all essentially about the idea of, as Oswaldo said, frontier justice vs true justice. Tarantino seems to be saying (and his joining of Black Lives Matter seems to support this reading) that it's very easy to justify straight up gleeful murder in the guise of justice or self defense, in the absence of accountability. The problem with Oswaldo's philosophy of "being dispassionate" is that passion is a hard thing to excise from judgments, especially in a society that has not moved past making second class citizens out of various groups. Even John Ruth, who presents himself as a slavery-hating Lincoln lover, is revealed to harbor racism at the tiniest of slight by Warren. And Daisy, who we never see commit any crime, is said to have yet stand trial, and acts in self defense throughout the movie, becomes the target of everyone's frustrations.

Another thing: Tarantino is very much aware of the criticism that follows his liberal use of the word "nigger," and has defended it with his belief that he has a purpose in using it. It would be naive, then, to not assume that he goes through the gamut of insults one can say to a woman in this movie without a purpose, as well. There is passion in those words, and the use of those words indicate the characters' incapability of true justice.

D_Davis
01-04-2016, 10:14 PM
Tarantino seems to be saying (and his joining of Black Lives Matter seems to support this reading) that it's very easy to justify straight up gleeful murder in the guise of justice or self defense, in the absence of accountability.

Totally agree. Which is why I said that this film, more than any of his others, is a direct response to our current sociopolitical climate.

Gizmo
01-04-2016, 10:41 PM
I gave it a mild yay, but agree that it's a bit overlong and poorly paced at times. I think cutting it down to 2 hours would have done wonders. I've never been much of a Tarantino fan, but his last couple were upward trending him for me. This is turning it back the other way.

1. Inglourious Basterds
2. Reservoir Dogs
3. Django Unchained
4/5. Kill Bill
4/5. The Hateful Eight
6. Pulp Fiction
Death Proof- NA
Jackie Brown- NA

Ezee E
01-05-2016, 03:39 AM
I gave it a mild yay, but agree that it's a bit overlong and poorly paced at times. I think cutting it down to 2 hours would have done wonders. I've never been much of a Tarantino fan, but his last couple were upward trending him for me. This is turning it back the other way.

1. Inglourious Basterds
2. Reservoir Dogs
3. Django Unchained
4/5. Kill Bill
4/5. The Hateful Eight
6. Pulp Fiction
Death Proof- NA
Jackie Brown- NA

Watch Jackie Brown.

Dukefrukem
01-05-2016, 12:13 PM
Watch Jackie Brown.

The second most overrated movie ever made.

Ezee E
01-05-2016, 01:54 PM
The second most overrated movie ever made.

So wrong.

number8
01-05-2016, 02:23 PM
As with any rankings, mine are always constantly in flux. But here's a moment captured in time, my ranking at this second:

1. Inglourious Basterds
2. Death Proof
3. Kill Bill
4. Reservoir Dogs
5. The Hateful 8
6. Jackie Brown
7. Django Unchained
8. Pulp Fiction

Skitch
01-05-2016, 09:22 PM
The second most overrated movie ever made.

I may be wrong, but I don't think of that movie as widely highly regarded, so I'm not sure how it could be overrated.

Skitch
01-05-2016, 09:23 PM
As with any rankings, mine are always constantly in flux. But here's a moment captured in time, my ranking at this second:

1. Inglourious Basterds
2. Death Proof
3. Kill Bill
4. Reservoir Dogs
5. The Hateful 8
6. Jackie Brown
7. Django Unchained
8. Pulp Fiction

On another day, that could easily be my lineup. Only thing that doesn't change for me is Kill Bill is best, and Pulp Fiction is least.

Milky Joe
01-05-2016, 09:40 PM
Am I the only person who still thinks Kill Bill Vol. 1 was the best iteration of that movie? I never actually watched The Whole Bloody Affair, but that first volume was the tits, just bled style. Part 2 was too talky. I dunno how I feel about the story being in chronological order, as the non-linear storytelling was part of its charm for me.

D_Davis
01-05-2016, 09:49 PM
Kill Bill is my 2nd least favorite Tarantino.

My ranking is (I guess...I mean it's mostly meaningless):

1. Pulp Fiction
2. Jackie Brown
3. Inglorious Basterds
4. Django
5. Death Proof
6. Hateful 8
7. Kill Bill
8. Reservoir Dogs

Ezee E
01-05-2016, 10:12 PM
Am I the only person who still thinks Kill Bill Vol. 1 was the best iteration of that movie? I never actually watched The Whole Bloody Affair, but that first volume was the tits, just bled style. Part 2 was too talky. I dunno how I feel about the story being in chronological order, as the non-linear storytelling was part of its charm for me.

Depends on the mood for me.

Irish
01-05-2016, 10:23 PM
Am I the only person who still thinks Kill Bill Vol. 1 was the best iteration of that movie? I never actually watched The Whole Bloody Affair, but that first volume was the tits, just bled style. Part 2 was too talky. I dunno how I feel about the story being in chronological order, as the non-linear storytelling was part of its charm for me.

No, you're not the only one. I've only seen both films separately, and once. The first part is a human cartoon, and I mean that in a good way. It's energetic and visually stunning. The second part is foggy to me; the only thing I can recall is Bill's deeply silly monologue at the end. The whole thing felt overwritten and ill-considered.

--

On rankings:

I tend to think of Tarantino's movies in groups, and loosely:

[ True Romance, Reservoir Dogs, Pulp Fiction, Jackie Brown ]

[ Kill Bill Part I, Kill Bill Part II ]

[ Death Proof, Basterds, Django, Hateful 8 ]

That first group is it for me (and I know True Romance isn't technically a "Tarantino film," but it sounds so much like one I always think of it that way). I think that first group contains his best work.

Jackie Brown is the turning point. It's probably the most mature thing he's done. He didn't get the commercial or critical response he wanted, so he went away and sulked for a bit and decided on a different direction.

I think QT gets less interesting the less he cares about structure and the more he moves away from traditional narrative.

That last group is also odd because it becomes increasingly mean-spirited. The joy that once floated around his movies is gone.

TGM
01-06-2016, 02:59 AM
Am I the only person who still thinks Kill Bill Vol. 1 was the best iteration of that movie? I never actually watched The Whole Bloody Affair, but that first volume was the tits, just bled style. Part 2 was too talky. I dunno how I feel about the story being in chronological order, as the non-linear storytelling was part of its charm for me.

Part 1 didn't work for me at all on its own, so much so that I put off watching Part 2 for a significant amount of time. But when I did finally get around to watching Part 2, it was together along with Part 1, in which the movie suddenly really pulled together and was damn impressive. I've never seen Part 2 separately, but I would imagine that it'd have a similar effect on me as watching Part 1 solo, ie, it wouldn't do anything for me and just wouldn't work without its other half. Kill Bill was always intended to be one big, grand, singular experience, and that's really how it should be viewed. Splitting that movie into two was always a mistake.

Pop Trash
01-06-2016, 07:14 AM
This is just... nothing.

What the fuck are you talking about? This is one of the nastiest films about America ever committed to celluloid.

ledfloyd
01-06-2016, 10:46 PM
What the fuck are you talking about? This is one of the nastiest films about America ever committed to celluloid.
I outlined a bunch of reasons why I felt like it didn't work in a subsequent post.

Basically, I don't think Quentin's grasp on American history is anywhere near as firm as his grasp on movie history.

MadMan
01-08-2016, 08:45 AM
I'm not surprised that I dug this film a lot more than some did here. Pretty great crossbreeding of The Thing and Reservoir Dogs. That final act is pure state of nature. Also Goggins gave one of my favorite performances of the decade in this film. He was hilarious.

Also QT ranked:

Django Unchained
Pulp Fiction
The Hateful Eight
Inglourious Basterds
Kill Bill Vol. 2
Jackie Brown
Reservoir Dogs
Death Proof
Kill Bill Vol. 1

transmogrifier
01-08-2016, 09:32 AM
Five minutes till reckoning...

Melville
01-08-2016, 10:36 AM
Am I the only person who still thinks Kill Bill Vol. 1 was the best iteration of that movie? I never actually watched The Whole Bloody Affair, but that first volume was the tits, just bled style. Part 2 was too talky. I dunno how I feel about the story being in chronological order, as the non-linear storytelling was part of its charm for me.
Completely agree. Vol 2 was a slog.

1. Inglourious Basterds
2. Django Unchained
3. Pulp Fiction
4. Kill Bill Vol 1
----don't really like the movies below this
5. Reservoir Dogs
6. Jackie Brown
7. Kill Bill Vol 2
8. Death Proof

I wasn't a fan before his last two movies, but I loved their postmodern movie versions of history. My expectations for Hateful 8 have been damped, and it sounds like it indulges in the aspects of Tarantino I dislike (e.g., interminable dialogue that I don't find at all interesting). But it still looks to be thematically and formally interesting.

Skitch
01-08-2016, 11:01 AM
Mel, considering your rankings you'll probably love it.

Wryan
01-08-2016, 04:46 PM
This is a frightening piece of theater and staging, shot through with amusements both dirty and clean. Russell's false bluster as big as his hair. Goggins being just superb as usual. Leigh getting the absolute most out of the fewest lines in recent memory. The lies we tell ourselves and one another to make it through life. I'll echo what some others have said and say that Quentin's usual sharp ear for dialogue falters a bit, if only because he seemingly wanted to make the most present and nakedly political film he could today. The dialogue here feels even more inventively false for the setting than the loopy, long-held linguistics in Basterds. (It's still sort of delightful.) And I'm just not sure what to make of the daffy near-Disney glow of the filler chapter's early moments. I expected cartoon birds to swoop in and help make coffee. It'd be a heinous shame if people only looked at Leigh's character as a punching bag. She held this thing together like her character's presence held the movie's men "together."

Melville
01-08-2016, 07:33 PM
Mel, considering your rankings you'll probably love it.
Cool. I'm looking forward to it either way.

transmogrifier
01-08-2016, 11:23 PM
I don't know....it's slightly better than the lumpy mess of Django Unchained, mainly because it streamlines the story, cuts down on the shaggy dog scenes in the margins, and manages to build a head of tension in a couple of places.... but unlike, say, Sicario, where the constant sense dread was played off a sympathetic, if ineffectual, lead and capped by a thematically satisfying audience "gotcha" moment that resonates given the real-world battle against Mexican cartels, here tension remains entirely on the surface level and without the anchor of a character to give much of a shit about, and once the plot machinations become explained, there is not much left to chew on. It also features some curiously bad directorial choices - e.g., the sudden narration for no reason, the ridiculous slow-motion talking at the climax. Still, Jackson and Leigh are spell-binding throughout on a pure charisma level (I'm sucker for long-take reaction shots, and Leigh has a doozy in the wagon near the start), and the over-the-top violence is actually quite funny in places.....so I don't know. A mild yay.

1. Reservoir Dogs - 84
2. Pulp Fiction - 84
3. Death Proof - 78
4. Inglourious Basterds - 70
5. The Hateful Eight - 63
6. Django Unchained - 58
7. Kill Bill Vol. 1 - 57
8. Kill Bill Vol. 2 - 47
9. Jackie Brown - 42

I've only ever seen Django, Death Proof, Kill Bill Vol. 2, and Jackie Brown once, so I plan to revisit them all in the next month or so; Basterds really improved in its second viewing, so here's hoping all of these others do as well (I hold out most hope for Jackie Brown)

D_Davis
01-09-2016, 12:38 AM
Thank you for reminding me of the slow motion taking. That was so weird and out of place.

Ivan Drago
01-10-2016, 02:03 AM
It is Tarantino's most hollow movie in terms of substance or themes, and feels more like a play than the rest of his work, but from a technical standpoint, this is his best directed movie. The score and cinematography were top-notch, and the entire cast knocks it out of the park, especially Jackson, Goggins and Leigh. The roadshow experience made it one to remember, too...it made me feel like the experience of seeing it was more of an event, and that's something missing from the movie-going experience nowadays. I hope he does that for his last two movies.

QT ranked:

1. Pulp Fiction
2. Django Unchained
3. Inglourious Basterds
4. The Hateful Eight
5. Reservoir Dogs
6. Jackie Brown
7. Death Proof
8. Kill Bill

Philip J. Fry
01-11-2016, 08:45 AM
Did Tarantino Zimmerman'd a racist white guy?

Or is it just me?

Dukefrukem
01-11-2016, 04:37 PM
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q3wiUNRv7sg

D_Davis
01-11-2016, 04:46 PM
Insightful as ever.


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7ccQyyCLtx8

Spinal
01-14-2016, 06:37 PM
So, I've decided that the payoff at the end just isn't earned or justified. Daisy's character never actually does anything evil (that we see) in this movie, that makes her long murder seem interesting, funny, justified anything really. In fact, I'm not quite sure how we're suppose to feel. The whole second half gives answers to the image that they present in the first half, but it's not really that interesting.

Enough though I liked the movie a lot, this would be my main criticism. I kept waiting for there to be a moment where we see just how truly awful and dangerous Daisy is. She uses violence to gain an advantage, yes. But given what we see in the movie and the way she is treated, this doesn't seem heinous enough for us to really get worked up over her character's fate. Samuel L. Jackson's character deserved comeuppance every bit as much as Daisy's character it seems, so I'm rooting for him because ..... why? Tarantino hints as themes of 'justice' vs. 'frontier justice', but apart from hearing about the distinction in a monologue, I don't know that the rest of the film really explores his thesis in a satisfying way.

But, boy, it's a well-acted, gorgeous-looking film.

Morris Schæffer
01-17-2016, 09:46 PM
Also as for the violence and sadism, it's not as bad as any episode of Game of Thrones. Maybe I'm just desensitized?

it's different. Game of thrones is shocking, disturbing, powerful. In h8ful 8 it's just violent...and kinda funny.

Morris Schæffer
01-18-2016, 10:54 AM
As I was watching this rather incredible movie, there were numerous times where I was envisioning a second movie, but where the Tatum, or any other, character was played by Timothy Olyphant. :)

Kurt Russell seemed to be in screaming mode most of the time which bordered real close on overacting. I'm probably the only one to think that. Sure, these are archetypes, but Russell was really overdoing it. This movie was a real hoot at times, especially Bichir, Jackson and Goggings. I sometimes laugh hard at the stupidest things. Michael Madsen sitting quietly and solemnly in that corner, but going absolutely berserk when someone opens the door with that subwoofer of a voice.

@Spinal: I was thinking this the whole time, but I was shocked at her transformation towards the end. She suddenly looked deranged, vile, as if possessed by some demonic force. And so in the end I believed! Where has this wonderful actress been? Perhaps I simply missed her in stuff.

I don't understand some of the choices made. The QT voice-over (what a shitty voice that man has), the slow-mo gunfights, the flashback where the bit with the coffee is explained by QT.

I too was reminded of Carpenter's The Thing in a few ways, including the moment when Ruth and OB start puking what appears to be gallons of blood.

Skitch
01-18-2016, 12:01 PM
Kurt Russell seemed to be in screaming mode most of the time which bordered real close on overacting. I'm probably the only one to think that.

You are not, sir.

number8
01-18-2016, 12:44 PM
I keep reading complaints about QT's use of one-off gimmicks that are disjointed from the rest of the movie (not just this one, but back in Basterds too) and I wonder if people have really forgotten that Tarantino is firstly a French New Wave geek. That stuff is all straight out of Godard.

Morris Schæffer
01-18-2016, 04:41 PM
I keep reading complaints about QT's use of one-off gimmicks that are disjointed from the rest of the movie (not just this one, but back in Basterds too) and I wonder if people have really forgotten that Tarantino is firstly a French New Wave geek. That stuff is all straight out of Godard.

I'm not enough into movies to know such things, but how does this knowledge make Russell's screaming somehow engaging? Anyhow, thanks for pointing it out.

Spinal
01-18-2016, 05:30 PM
@Spinal: I was thinking this the whole time, but I was shocked at her transformation towards the end. She suddenly looked deranged, vile, as if possessed by some demonic force. And so in the end I believed! Where has this wonderful actress been? Perhaps I simply missed her in stuff.



Oh, yeah, Jennifer Jason Leigh is one of the best there is. Last Exit to Brooklyn, Miami Blues, Mrs. Parker and the Vicious Circle ... even Single White Female. It's absolutely shocking to me that this is her first Oscar nomination.

And I agree with you that Kurt Russell was a weak link. Not enough to really bother me. But I just don't think he's on par with the others in terms of talent.

Ezee E
01-18-2016, 10:27 PM
The comment about Madsen is dead on. I looked forward to that door opening each time because it was hilarious.

Kirby Avondale
01-19-2016, 01:08 AM
And I agree with you that Kurt Russell was a weak link. Not enough to really bother me. But I just don't think he's on par with the others in terms of talent.
This sentiment is a deep mystery to me. Russell killed it. The baton passing from Russell to Tatum, I'd say, is when the movie really started to stumble.

MadMan
01-20-2016, 07:55 AM
I keep reading complaints about QT's use of one-off gimmicks that are disjointed from the rest of the movie (not just this one, but back in Basterds too) and I wonder if people have really forgotten that Tarantino is firstly a French New Wave geek. That stuff is all straight out of Godard.

I haven't. Which is why I don't have a problem with him doing it.

Also I laughed at a lot of the horrible things that occurred in this film. When Jackson blew Tatum'a head off I busted out laughing for a good two minutes. That was darkly hilarious.

However the poisoning scene was really gross. I did cringe when JJL got blood puked on her as Ruth beat her up as he died.

So I don't know if that means I'm a horrible person or maybe I'm also desensitized to onscreen violence after years of watching horror films and violent films.

I was thinking the other day that both Tarentino and Ben Wheatley really have a knack for using violence properly in their films. Both are also favorite modern filmmakers of mine.

MadMan
01-20-2016, 08:02 AM
Also I loved all of performances, save for one. This is one of my favorite cast groups in recent memory. I liked how both Roth and Madsen were understated in their performances. Also Bichir and Goggins matched each other pretty well in the humor department.

I realized today that I have not seen very much from Leigh. She earned that Oscar nom imo. My favorite though is still Goggins. I really need to watch Justified.

Was Russell the weak link? Nah I think that was Bruce Dern. They could have casted any old guy in that role.

PS: Tatum surprised me btw. I actually want a movie where he plays the main villain.

Spinal
01-20-2016, 04:40 PM
They could have casted any old guy in that role.


Wilford Brimley needs to be in a Tarantino movie!

Morris Schæffer
01-21-2016, 05:29 AM
Wilford Brimley needs to be in a Tarantino movie!

Hell, why not go the distance and secure Kirk Douglas!

Stay Puft
01-25-2016, 12:34 AM
I liked the first half of this quite a bit. I saw the 70mm roadshow release and damn was it phenomenal. It completely lost me in the second half, though. That flashback chapter nearly put me to sleep, and while he wasn't bad or anything, Tatum just felt horribly miscast. Lots of bizarre artistic choices, too, as a few have mentioned, the slow motion and voice over stuff especially.

The part with the blood vomiting was funny because I couldn't stop thinking about the puking scene in Team America.

ledfloyd
01-25-2016, 04:55 PM
The part with the blood vomiting was funny because I couldn't stop thinking about the puking scene in Team America.
I couldn't stop thinking of Family Guy, which may be why I didn't enjoy it as much as you.

Ezee E
01-25-2016, 11:01 PM
Yeah, Tatum may be the most miscast Tarantino character ever I'm thinking.

transmogrifier
01-25-2016, 11:03 PM
Yeah, Tatum may be the most miscast Tarantino character ever I'm thinking.

Was never a fan of BJ Novak in IB.

MadMan
02-03-2016, 07:57 AM
Wilford Brimley needs to be in a Tarantino movie!

Hell yes.

D_Davis
02-05-2016, 04:24 PM
Oh man...this is so fucking cool. Love it.

http://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/films/news/the-guitar-kurt-russell-smashed-in-the-hateful-eight-was-an-antique-not-a-prop-and-the-museum-is-a6854921.html

Wryan
02-05-2016, 04:28 PM
Oh man...this is so fucking cool. Love it.

http://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/films/news/the-guitar-kurt-russell-smashed-in-the-hateful-eight-was-an-antique-not-a-prop-and-the-museum-is-a6854921.html

Is this sarcasm by chance? I think that's terrible, and terribly stupid. How unfortunate to let that happen, imo.

number8
02-05-2016, 04:48 PM
Yeah, I get really sad when I read about things like that happening.

Something similar happened in Battlestar Galactica. No one told Edward James Olmos that a model ship they used in the admiral quarters was on loan from the maritime museum, and he smashed it to pieces when he improvised a crying scene.

Scar
02-05-2016, 05:35 PM
Is this sarcasm by chance? I think that's terrible, and terribly stupid. How unfortunate to let that happen, imo.

I hope it's sarcasm. Your thoughts mirror my own.

Spinal
02-05-2016, 06:59 PM
How do you put an antique guitar into an actor's hands and not tell him what it is? Something doesn't add up here.

Skitch
02-05-2016, 06:59 PM
Why the fuck would they have such a priceless item on set like that? I've played guitar my whole life, let me tell you, that didn't look any different than any ratty old acoustic that couldve been easily replaced and no one would've noticed. There was no reason for this accident to occur in the first place.

Lazlo
02-05-2016, 07:19 PM
How do you put an antique guitar into an actor's hands and not tell him what it is? Something doesn't add up here.

Quentin wanted Leigh's reaction to be impacted? Someone made a mistake? Everyone knew and just lied to the guitar people? Those are the only reasons I can come up with?

I mean, was there supposed to be a cut in the scene and it plays as one shot in the movie because that's the only take they could get? Weird.

I don't care a lot about the guitar, the story is fascinating though.

number8
02-05-2016, 08:03 PM
How do you put an antique guitar into an actor's hands and not tell him what it is? Something doesn't add up here.

They didn't, though. They put it in Leigh's hands, who did know it was the real thing. Russell grabbed it from her hands.


Why the fuck would they have such a priceless item on set like that? I've played guitar my whole life, let me tell you, that didn't look any different than any ratty old acoustic that couldve been easily replaced and no one would've noticed. There was no reason for this accident to occur in the first place.

There's an extended shot of her actually playing a song on the real thing from start to finish. That's what they wanted to capture. They did make several replicas of the guitar to get the other shots of it being handled, but Leigh was still holding the real thing when Russell just went ahead with the next action, thinking it was a copy.

Skitch
02-05-2016, 09:15 PM
There's an extended shot of her actually playing a song on the real thing from start to finish. That's what they wanted to capture. They did make several replicas of the guitar to get the other shots of it being handled, but Leigh was still holding the real thing when Russell just went ahead with the next action, thinking it was a copy.

I understand that, but theres zero reason to have a priceless guitar for that song.

Grouchy
02-06-2016, 06:01 PM
So I've finally seen this one. Having read the script when it leaked (am I the only one here who did that?) I was beyond being surprised by the slow pacing, the lenght of the scenes or the viciousness of the characters. I was a bit surprised by how on my read I'd missed the themes of the work, which become apparent when you add the mise-en-scene. I consider it another Tarantino movie about race relations, although a lot subtler than Django or Jackie Brown and adding the dimension of dealing with misogyny a bit. Amongst the things that were a lot better than the pictures I saw in my head are the series of shots of Sam L. Jackson telling the cock-sucking story and the continuing subplot of the Lincoln letter. The poison scene was also pretty intense. Like many of you, I'm not a fan of the penultimate chapter. It has a couple of good character moments (Roth switching accents, Tatum telling Dern to be cool) but it delays the resolution unnecessarily when it has already reached a dramatic climax and, really, it tells the audience almost nothing new. Unlike other Tarantino digressions like the Superman speech or the exploding cinema explanation, I don't think it really worked.

I still love the movie, though. Those 70mm vistas at the beginning are the best argument for keep working on film I've ever seen. And the acting is beyond reproach - Leigh is particularly excellent, I love her maniac faces. Goggins was also killer. Really, when you gather a large ensemble of character actors and your weak link is Bruce Dern, you are doing something right. I also can't help but love the premise because in the surface it's very similar to the first script I ever wrote, which also featured a band of wanderers getting stuck in a house during a storm.

I think the reason QT fans are rejecting this (or at least in my circle of friends) is because it's a middle step on an evolution by Quentin. We've all seen those types of films from other filmmakers but, usually, the Tarantino product is a lot more polished when it finally comes out. This time around, I feel like he's investigating a new direction but he isn't quite there yet, for all his accomplishments. I might be wrong but that's my prediction.

The guitar thing is moronic, though. I'm irked a museum collector like QT wouldn't appreciate the need to care for that guitar. Also, like Skitch says, the scene could have featured any goddamn guitar and still work the same way.

transmogrifier
02-06-2016, 10:10 PM
If I was a museum curator, I wouldn't be lending out guitars worth 200 grand to movie shoots.

Dukefrukem
03-23-2016, 12:59 AM
https://vimeo.com/158649742

ContinentalOp
04-02-2016, 03:22 PM
This movie surprised the hell out of me. Great dialogue, characters, plot (an effective mystery), Tarantino's best cast since Jackie Brown. His best movie since JB. And it's a great hangout movie featuring actual moral ambiguity. Can't get enough of that in movies. Only nitpicks are the unnecessary narration and some of the over-kills.

1. Pulp Fiction- ****
2. Jackie Brown- ****
3. The Hateful Eight- *** 1/2
4. Reservoir Dogs- *** 1/2
5. Inglorious Basterds- ***
6. Django Unchained- ** 1/2
7. Kill Bill Vol. 2- ** 1/2

8. Death Proof- * 1/2
9. Kill Bill Vol. 1- *

Grouchy
04-03-2016, 04:07 PM
9. Kill Bill Vol. 1- *
The fuck?

Dukefrukem
04-03-2016, 04:09 PM
It's so funny how we are all over the place with QT rankings.

Grouchy
04-04-2016, 03:45 PM
1. Inglourious Basterds
2. Pulp Fiction
3. Reservoir Dogs
4. Kill Bill Vol. I
5. Jackie Brown
6. Django Unchained
7. Kill Bill Vol. II
8. Death Proof
9. The Hateful Eight (needs rewatch, though)

Ezee E
04-16-2016, 07:31 PM
Rewatched today, and my thoughts don't change. In fact, now that the surprises are known, it kind of gets worse by a little. It's still interesting to see the actors working with each other, but there are some overlong parts, especially in the revelation of the Lincoln letter. It's almost the same exact dialog repeated.

Sycophant
06-15-2016, 07:23 PM
I'm struggling a bit with this film after finally watching it last night. In truth, I think I need a second viewing to better assess it, but I can't see that happening any time soon. For now, I'll spit out some thoughts. Negative or hmmmmm stuff first.

I'd agree with many that Tarantino's ear for dialogue is a bit off this time. It often seems delivered or framed as more clever than it comes off.

The voiceover bit, clearly a Godard-inspired choice, might be really clever or really unnecessary. Of course, Tarantino's long played with inconsistent aesthetics and framing devices, and in the more anarchic, boundary-flexible pastiche cinema of a Kill Bill, I find it thrilling. After a normal movie's running time of somber, grim Hawks-and-Carpenter's-Thing staged for a theatrical allegory about the lie of post-racial, post-sexist America (I think that's what this is), it felt off.I couldn't help remembering reading Tarantino's earlier scripts where that's exactly the kind of voice he uses in the his narrative descriptions. It's kind of neat. The selection of Tarantino himself for this is I'm sure a nod to this, but I'm not sure the distancing effect fit with everything else the movie does.

Tarantino often seems to be trying to tell us about ourselves by reflecting on our popular arts. Here, is he trying to tell us about ourselves by trying to draw us in our popular arts?

I would be in the camp where Kurt Russell often seems to be a bit too cartoony. So much so that I wondered if he wasn't the biggest phony of all from the start (brilliant misdirection or a slightly tone-deaf performance? the latter, I'm sure)--a lot of his lines sound like voiceover for a wild west video game (again, often, not always--his feeling of betrayal at the Lincoln Letter was a high note).

Moment-to-moment there are some amazing sequences. The performances are typically really good, and I respect the particular, idiosyncratic ugliness of the movie. It's a bold and maybe necessary--if not entirely satisfying--critique of America. The resolution is something I'm still trying to unravel, and I wonder if it's too thorny and ugly and in need of unraveling for its own good.

There was a live staged reading of this after the script leaked, right? I actually think this has excellent potential as a stage production, if one were to cut out the voiceover tricks and the entire flashback.

Grouchy
06-15-2016, 07:31 PM
There was a live staged reading of this after the script leaked, right? I actually think this has excellent potential as a stage production, if one were to cut out the voiceover tricks and the entire flashback.
I actually could see the flashback working better on live theater. Don't ask me to explain it, though.

Sycophant
06-15-2016, 08:50 PM
I actually could see the flashback working better on live theater. Don't ask me to explain it, though.

Interesting! I'm inclined to disagree, but I'm not too up for explaining my thoughts on that either.

number8
06-15-2016, 09:12 PM
Non-linear staging and the aside is more of a tradition of theater than film.

DavidSeven
08-15-2016, 10:48 PM
Since Kill Bill, I've approached each of Tarantino's eccentric genre pieces with increasing trepidation. I'm not exactly sure why since I've enjoyed them all. His most grounded film -- Jackie Brown -- is probably his worst, as it is so beholden to someone else's purely functional plot that it loses the exuberance inherent in everything else he's made. But I guess I've always expected that he would hit a breaking point eventually. A point where the story becomes too referential to genre, the dialogue becomes too stylized, and the whole of it becomes too far removed from anything resembling reality apart from cinema.

I won't pretend that this film doesn't skirt that edge, but I was utterly engrossed by it nonetheless. While perhaps not as structural masterful as Death Proof, as thematically cogent as Inglourious Basterds, as raw and powerful as Reservoir Dogs, or as straight-up exhilarating as Pulp Fiction, The Hateful Eight continues and expands on the Tarantino lineage of unforgettable scene and sequence building. And I dare say this is his best acted film. Trapping these actors -- inhibiting these characters -- in this single setting was like incubating a master class. I enjoyed every performance, scene-chewing and all. It is, however, an aggressively mean picture. My tolerance for that is generally high, but, even for me, the unpleasantness gets ratcheted up to a degree that sometimes doesn't feel useful or warranted. Sometimes I miss the low budget Tarantino, who was forced to only "suggest" his most disturbing violence by moving it off-screen.

Anyway, quality stuff. Loved the performances. The brutality becomes a bit much, but not enough to topple the film or unwind some breathtaking sequences built almost entirely on dialogue and performance.