Is Inglorious Basterds a Postmodern text? (2,054 words)

Quentin Tarantino is well-known for his direction of postmodern films with personal elements of himself reflected throughout them. Inglorious Basterds was no different, and released on 19th August 2009, the film was set in the Second World War which suggests a non fictional foundation for the film, however involved relevant trademarks linked to Tarantino.
As a director, Tarantino consistently likes to put himself into his films, for example, at the start of the film, the opening titles are shown in bright yellow text which links to the fact that it is Tarantino's favourite colour and the fact that this is so obvious could also be relevant to the fact that yellow does not connote a bloody world war and due to this, the text could be seen as the first reference to a postmodern text. This yellow text is also shown in some of Tarantino's other postmodern films, for example 'Pulp Fiction' starring John Travolta and Uma Thurman.
Although the film has a true setting and understory, Tarantino makes many references to the fact that the plot of the film is fictional. For example, 'Once upon a time in Nazi Occupied France...', the title of the first chapter of the film makes universal reference to a classic fairy-tale opening, and this film being far from a fairy-tale could ultimately suggest that Tarantino wanted to use this in contrast as a postmodern element, it almost connotes humour in a way also and links to Levi-Strauss' theory. There is also a link to the fact that Tarantino sectioned his film into chapters which connotes a fairy-tale story whereby each chapter is set in a different place.
The first chapter shows us panoramic views of the French mountains which holds direct reference to the opening scene of 'The Sound Of Music' starring Julie Andrews in 1959. The panoramic shots of the mountains are shown as very painterly which holds reference to 1950's and previous film sets whereby they would paint panoramic views such as this. 'The Sound Of Music' was also set in a Nazi occupied country which could suggest why Tarantino made reference. This intercontextual reference is continued also later on in the chapter with a shot of Shoshanna running through the long blades of grass in the direction of the mountains which in my opinion links directly to the panoramic shots of Julie Andrews singing 'The Hills are Alive' in 'The Sound Of Music'. The doorway shot of Shoshanna running from the La Padite dairy farm also shows direct reference to a shot from 'The Searchers' in 1956 where John Wayne stands silhouetted in a doorway. This is a shot that has been referenced to many other directors however the fact that Tarantino has chosen it for this film could be another example of his involvement of post modern elements. The western theme of 'The Searchers' in my opinion could be referenced to the spaghetti western remixed soundtrack to this chapter. Tarantino re-used original soundtracks throughout this film although in this chapter particularly, the intercontextual link to 'The Searchers' and the spaghetti western soundtrack could be seen as a postmodern element.
In this chapter, there are also links of self reflectivity again to Tarantino. For example, he is well known for liking to involve exposed parts of a film set in order to continue the knowledge to the audience that the film is postmodern and fictional and in this scene, he uses a birds eye shot of the La Padite household where the beams are exposed from the attic and the floorboards have gone. This is also shown later in the film and reminds the audience that the film is not real.
In the second chapter of the film, entitled 'Inglorious Basterds', we see the yellow text again during the 'Hugo Stiglitz sequence' where his name is bannered across the screen. This sequence almost seems out of place in a film set in the time of war and has reference to blaxploitation films aswell as spaghetti westerns. The music used in this sequence is also from a blaxpolitation film with a voice over by Samuel L Jackson, all of this adding postmodern elements to the film. As well as Brad Pitt's over exaggerated characterization of Also Raine, the 'scalping' of the Germans is also an exaggerated act from the Basterds although both could have link to Red Indian cultures from Spaghetti Western films. This would not only be yet another postmodern element, but a link to Aldo Raine's character as he says that he has descendants of the Red Indian culture.
The third chapter, entitled 'A German Night In Paris', involves Levi Strauss' theory of bricolage, whereby taking 'debris' from other media texts, you can apply reference to them in your own media text and make it postmodern. Strauss developed his theory further and saw that directors constructed texts from other texts by process of the following: addition, deletion, substitution, and transposition (transformation). In this chapter, music from the soundtracks of bloxploitation films are used in addition as well as create transposition by transforming the historical era of wartime1940's and making it postmodern.
'Operation Kino' is the fourth out of five chapters within the film and involves a significant postmodern link to Tarentino and his foot fetish. In other Tarentino films such as 'Pulp Fiction’, he makes it very knowledgeable to the audience that he has a foot fetish and is not ashamed to show everyone on screen, this is no different in Inglorious Basterds as at the end of the 'tavern' shoot out scene, we see Hans Lander pick up Bridget Von Hammersmark's shoe which could be seen as a 'Cinderella moment' and holds direct contextual link to fairy tales again. Although this reference is very traditional and universally known, Tarentino goes against the conventions of a traditional fairy-tale by having Hans Lander, the villain, pick up the shoe and have a 'prince charming moment'.
Previous to this, the 'tavern scene' also holds a huge postmodern relevance to Spaghetti Western shootout films by having close up shots of the characters faces, much similar to the shots used in a Mexican standoff in a western film. The bartender also puts his hand under the bar to retrieve his shotgun which is almost comically similar to a western shootout, making yet again another postmodern link to spaghetti westerns.
Another element that could suggest a postmodern fictional film could be the fact that there is no real upset at the deaths of Hugo Stiglitz and Archie Hicox. This is strange from an audiences point of view as traditional war films would have a backlash or upset if a main character died, although this is consistent in some respects with the genre of multiple heroes and is similar in films such as 'The Dirty Dozen' and 'The Magnificent Seven' which both show link to 'Inglorious Basterds'.
In the last chapter of the film, entitled 'Revenge of the giant face', the 'projection box scene' holds significant relevance to postmodernism. This scene between Frederick Zoller and Shoshanna appears to have an unconventional take on a love scene in my opinion, much similar to the final scene of 'Romeo & Juliet' where they both lay dead next to one another and where one dies before the other which links again to another text suggesting postmodernist elements. Shoshanna is wearing red in this scene which contrasts Frederick's white uniform and typically both connote good and evil, love and purity, passion and innocence, or death and life perhaps? It is unusual to see that Frederick is the character wearing white, and although this was a Nazi uniform of honour, as an audience we would expect Shoshanna to be wearing the white as we are on her side. Shoshanna is also wearing no shoes in this scene, which could link back to the start of the film where she is running away from the La Padite dairy farm, it also holds outside reference to 'South Pacific' perhaps which is a musical film directed by Joshua Logan in 1958 where a sub story plot of a navy soldier who falls in love with a native island girl. This could also link to Tarantino's foot fetish. The Postmodern mix of music used by Tarantino in this chapter changes throughout. For example, before Frederick comes up to the projection box, a drum sequence is heard, reminiscent of the drums heard at battle, signalling that someone is going to die which would link to the fact that Shoshanna shoots Frederick soon after. This contrasts Shoshanna's death which is accompanied by a soft romantic score, the editing is also slowed down at this point which could suggest our empathy towards her. This romantic music is known as contrapuntal music as you would expect the romantic music to be before the killing, not the other way around. This suggests a postmodern element from Tarantino. Later on in the scene, Shoshanna's face is projected onto the cinema screen where the smoke surrounding her could be contextually referenced to fairy tales as well as the whole sequence being reminiscent of a scene from the 1939 film 'The Wizard Of Oz' where the wizards face is projected onto the screen to appear frightening.
Looking at Fiske, I can see that from an audiences point of view, we could consider 'Inglorious Basterds' to be a war film, just from watching other war films previously although we have never lived through the war ourselves. We can only apply conventions of what we have learnt and seen from other war films and apply them to Inglorious Basterds, which Fiske develops from Roland Barthes semic code (1987). For example, within the film there are important historical people that are characterized for example Adolf Hitler and Churchill as well as recognizable mise en scene such as the Nazi uniform designed by Hugo Boss. Despite this truth, at the end of the film, Tarentino claims his own version of how the war ended, or how it should’ve ended in his opinion. Although Tarentino's choice to change the outcome of the war could be seen as wishful thinking, his choices to change the outcome could have link to the fact that he wants the audience to remember that the film is postmodern and fictional, just as he had made obvious signals before such as the exposed sets and fairy-tale beginning. Due to this, the film has many possible genre categories it could be placed into such as a parody, war, or a gangster movie.
Tarentino's portrayal of war throughout Inglorious Basterds could possibly be viewed as a light-hearted approach to a serious and dark time in history. This could be relevant to the fact that in traditional war films, there is usually music related to war or no music at all, so the fact that Tarentino has chosen a postmodern soundtrack by incorporating the likes of David Bowie and music from blaxploitation films could be seen as him creating humour from the war. Usually the absence of music in a traditional war film marks the film as being more realistic. Another way in which Inglorious Basterds juxtaposes traditional war films is that it is character lead and not mission lead meaning that a traditional war film is based around a mission of war that the audience are involved into and want to know the outcome. Despite this, we as an audience still do not find out a lot about the backgrounds of characters in 'Inglorious Basterds' and they are very vague, in my opinion, Tarentino could've used this in reference to real historical war time where nobody was them self during the war and everyone had a uniform and a new purpose, forgetting and not needing to mention about their past before the war.
In conclusion, I believe that Inglorious Basterds is in fact a postmodern text that is based around and has some traditional conventions of a 'war’ genre film, however, the huge postmodern elements involved and incorporated by Tarentino show the bigheartedness of his belief in making a real war film and shows that he does not want audiences to view the film as being 'real'. Overall I believe Tarentino's biggest postmodern statement is his 'deletion' of true historical events by changing the course of history and showing his own fictional end to the war.

Leni Riefenstahl.

Helene Bertha Amalie "Leni" Riefenstahl (German pronunciation: [ˈʁiːfənʃtaːl]; 22 August 1902 – 8 September 2003) was a German film director, actress and dancer widely noted for her aesthetics and innovations as a filmmaker. Her most famous film was Triumph des Willens (Triumph of the Will), a propaganda film made at the 1934 Nuremberg congress of the Nazi Party. Riefenstahl's prominence in the Third Reich along with her personal friendship with Adolf Hitler thwarted her film career following Germany's defeat in World War II, after which she was arrested but released without any charges.

Postmodern theories and texts.

Postmodernism theories and texts

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Notes

• Apply Genette to my Inglourious Basterds Essay.
• Then read pages 13-17 and apply Baudrillard and Lyotard to Inglourious Basterds. These theorists will be very helpful when answering my essay question.

Inglourious Basterds - Chapter 4 - Operation Kino.

Analysing 'Inglorious Basterds' tavern scene
For Lights, Camera . . . , we ask a craftsperson to talk about a specific scene in his or her latest film. This week, Sally Menke,Sally Menke, film editor on " Inglourious Basterds," talks about the shootout scene in the basement tavern.
Quentin Tarantino told the multiple stories of "Inglourious Basterds" in five distinct chapters, and we knew from the script stage the film would hinge around the set-piece in the tavern La Louisianne. The daunting task of putting a 25-page dialogue sequence, spoken almost entirely in German, in the middle of the film, weighed heavily on everyone's minds, and it all had to come together in the cutting room. Just mentioning the name La Louisianne created tension among the crew, but we needed that tension to transcend to the audienceIn La Louisianne, the Basterds meet their German movie star contact, Bridget von Hammersmark (Diane Kruger) for the first time, and they must all pretend to be old friends by posing as Nazi officers. Much to the Basterds' surprise, they not only find Bridget in the dangerously cramped tavern, they find the basement bar filled with drunken, celebrating Nazis, one of whom happens to be enamored with the German movie star and continually pesters their table. The tension in the group runs high as we watch the real Nazis begin to question the origin of the British Archie Hicox's (Michael Fassbender) strange accent, and we hold our breath.
La Louisianne required detailed attention to character development as well as numerous story points, all the while using the device of language to create tension. Quentin and I felt it was essential to have the characters not simply drive the scene toward a plot point, but to be fully nuanced characters, while continually building the tension that would culminate in an explosive gun battle that kills all but one. We knew the gunfight would work all the better if we could carefully manipulate and build the tension through a give and take of emotions, playing a cat-and-mouse game with our characters -- and our audience.
Our editorial intentions had to be completely clear in how we wanted the audience to feel at any specific moment in the scene -- the Basterds are screwed, wait, no, they're OK, oh, no they aren't, this Nazi knows, he's on to them, no, no, they are OK -- until Hicox makes the fatal error that unequivocally gives them all away as impostors. Every line had a layer of tension, and we needed to play their reactions to the lines as much as the lines themselves to build it properly. Every beat counted. Every second someone delayed their response gave the audience a chance to think, "Did they figure it out? Do they know?"
We obsessively controlled every moment so that in contrast, when the climactic gun battle finally does erupt, it explodes in the loudest, craziest and most shocking way possible. But again, while doing this, we always had to return to the human element -- our character development. Hicox gets a bit of a tear in his eye when he realizes he will live no longer, and if we have done our jobs correctly, so will our audience.
Another challenge was to seamlessly integrate a lot of key information for upcoming plot points without them feeling perfunctory, heavy-handed or pedantic. For example, we needed to show a close-up of Bridget's shoes so there was no doubt in the audience's mind who it belonged to later on when Col. Hans Landa (Christoph Waltz) discovers the shoe while inspecting the aftermath in the bar. We can't draw attention to the shoe in a way that says, "We're showing you a close-up of a foot," but we do need to make enough of a point of it so the audience knows it's Bridget's -- instantly. The solution was to use the shoe as character introduction, to show the style and glamour of this movie star/double agent whom we, the audience and our characters, meet for the first timeThe tavern music was another way we developed a character. The music at first works environmentally and emotionally in the scene but then functions to locate a yet-to-be-seen, off-screen character, the Gestapo Maj. Hellstrom, who, when revealed, we see has clearly been controlling the music selections. We also now know that without a doubt Hellstrom had been listening to the Basterds' conversation the entire time, and we now use the absence of that same music when Hellstrom purposefully removes the needle from the record player to show that he has taken control of the scene. The Basterds, and our audience, are now in Hellstrom's hands.
The last issue we had to contend with was the length. A nearly 25-minute dialogue scene that starts 69 minutes into the film can be a potential challenge for audiences, as most scenes by this point play considerably shorter. But it was our belief that if we could hold the scene's tension, we could not only develop character and attend to the story but actually stop the scene to allow Hellstrom to play his King Kong card game, a story in and of itself, which cinematically alludes to another oppressed group, the slaves in America. I could go on about many other layers that needed our attention, but, unfortunately, in this situation I am not the editor with final cut and must end the piece here.