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Best of the Genre: Biggest Badasses – Westerns (Part 1)

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I love westerns. Love them. But unfortunately, I honestly don’t see any new westerns coming out that’ll totally upend and reinvent the genre, thus establishing a new character that could trump any of the following ten. That’s not to say that the western genre is stagnant, or recycling material, but it’s a genre that has clearly peaked, and is in its twilight years, where most modern movies are looking back at its respective genre, rather than looking forward. New great westerns are still being made, they’re just not nearly as popular as they once were, and as such, innovation is mostly being left by the wayside. I suppose you could count Django Unchained as innovation, but I’m still very skeptical on my opinion of that film, a skepticism I’m sure isn’t shared by my colleagues here at Grizzly Bomb.

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Django Unchained: New Spot shows Sam Jackson

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Did you think it was possible to get so many great films in one year; The Avengers, The Dark Knight Rises, The Hobbit, Skyfall and several others – well Tarantino looks to be bringing this great year in cinema to an end with a December release of Django Unchained. This latest TV spot is going to make you wet yourself with excitement, like all good trailers should.

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Movie Trailers

New ‘Django Unchained’ International Trailer

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The international trailer for Quentin Tarantino’s Django Unchained has been released. It’s mostly the same as the US trailer, with a few extra shots of difference, most notably, the inclusion of Samuel L. Jackson as a billed star in the film.

While the movie does look like it’s definitely going to be well crafted, I still can’t help but hold reservations on it. The James Brown soundtrack doesn’t work for me, but I understand it’s attempting a melding of the Spaghetti Western/Blaxploitation genres. What does work for me, is seeing Quentin Tarantino actually having a TRUE homage, with the final shot of the trailer, showing Jamie Foxx sitting with Franco Nero, who some may recognize as the original star of Sergio Corbucci’s Django. Even though that shot is included in the US trailer, I imagine it’ll play quite well with international crowds, where Sergio Corbucci’s name is more well-known. It would seem QT is continuing the long tradition of having a western revolving around a character named Django, even if he isn’t THE Django, from the original film. There are over 30 unofficial sequels to the original Django, as Italy has a long history of its filmmakers “borrowing” character and movie names to help a knockoff films chances at the box office. Tarantino seems to be falling right in line with this idea, only he is celebrating that character and tradition, rather than looking to make a quick buck off a name brand.

That’s Franco Nero on the right, the OG Django. He doesn’t look happy.

I always hold fast to the rule that you should never truly judge how good or bad a movie is until you see it, (see: Battleship), so I’m trying to stay positive with my feelings about Django Unchained. Maybe I’m just being overly negative, but Death Proof was really bad, and Inglorious Basterds was such a self-aggrandizing mess, it’s taken away the immediate optimism I used to have for Quentin Tarantino’s films. Regardless, like all of his films, I’ll end up seeing them no matter what, because for better or worse, nobody really makes movies like Tarantino. He has an undeniably unique voice, and is accomplished at doing what he sets out to do.  [Ed. Note – Death Proof and Inglorious Basterds are both awesome.]

Christmas 2012, we’ll probably all get Django’d.

Movie Trailers

First Official “Django Unchained” Trailer Looks to Be A Christmas Miracle

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It’s that time again! It’s time for a new Quentin Tarantino flick (cue the applause)! After the 2009 masterpiece that we know as Inglourious Basterds, QT brings us Django Unchained, the story of a slave named Django (Jamie Foxx) who is freed by notorious bounty hunter, Dr. King Schultz (Christoph Waltz). With hopes of making Django his deputy, Schultz begins training the man, preparing him for the biggest fight of his life; to kill Calvin Candie (Leonardo DiCaprio), a ruthless plantation owner who is in possession of Django’s wife, Broomhilda (Kerry Washington).

Well, leave your skepticism and cynicism at the door, people, because Django Unchained is really the only thing I want for Christmas (well, maybe The Great Gatsby, too). This immensely entertaining, hilarious, action-packed, and, most of all, fun trailer has me wanting more….a lot more. Quentin Tarantino seems to be in full force here after the critically acclaimed Inglourious Basterds, which was nominated for eight Oscars (winning one for Best Supporting Actor to Christoph Waltz). It seems as if the Academy has finally recognized Tarantino not only as a filmmaker, but as a genre.

I also love the anti-type casting that Tarantino has done here. It’s been a while since DiCaprio has played an out-and-out villain, while this film marks the first time that Christoph Waltz plays the good guy (a compromised protagonist at best, but I’ll take what I can get). Jamie Foxx plays the title role, and after a couple names were picked up and dropped, I feel like Tarantino has made the right choice putting Foxx in the role.

All the Tarantino-esque factors are definitely in place. The odd plot, the beautifully staged brutality, the generational gap bridging (putting a funky groove in a Civil War-era spaghetti western? I think yes), the witty dialogue, and everything in between. There’s just no way around it, Django Unchained is going to be the real deal.

Check out the official trailer right here:

Quentin Tarantino, Djano, Jamie Foxx, Christoph Waltz

Movie News & Opinions

‘Django Unchained’ Update: New Pictures…

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Quentin Tarantino is back again with yet another scrappy yet captivating ode to genre cinema of years past, this time with his love letter to westerns, Django Unchained. After previously tackling the “Macaroni Combat” genre of WW2 films with Inglorious Basterds, he’s gone to the opposite end of old italian cinema and is diving headfirst into bringing his own personal spaghetti western for all of us. The plot is fairly simple and by the numbers: Slave gets freed by bounty hunter, bounty hunter teaches a slave to bounty hunt, slave vows to find his wife who is being held at a sadistic slave ranch, BUT slave ranch holds slave battles ran Thunderdome style by cruel slave owner! Will he get her back? You know, the usual sort of stuff you see in every western.

Great, but how do I get this shot of the gun to be an ‘homage”?

If it wasn’t apparent, the cast is typical Quentin Tarantino “Weird-at-first-but-actually-works.” style casting, with Jamie Foxx as the titular Django, Christoph Waltz as the bounty hunter, and Leonardo DiCaprio as the slave ranch owner, who is named, no kidding, Calvin Candy. That slave ranch? Candyland.

No wives until you escape the chocolate swamp!

Overall I’m excited for the movie, because westerns are great, and spaghetti westerns are always something special. It stands to reason that QT seems intent on trying really really hard to emulate Sergio Leone with his last few movies, and whether or not he’ll be successful is really up to how the whole thing comes together. I’mma homage you so hard… I’mma homage you so hard… Inglorious Basterds, while entertaining, was a movie that was definitely less than the sum of its parts, but its opening scene was classic Leone emulation, right down to the fitting Morricone soundtrack. Granted it’s easy to make anything seem epic and grandiose with that man’s score, but it was one solid, perfect nugget of gold in that movie that absolutely worked perfectly. If Django Unchained can be a whole movie like that scene, it’ll become one of the very best modern westerns of all time, if not though… well we’ll see. Who am I kidding, I know come December 25, I’ll be heading to see it with Christmas cash in tow.
I’mma homage you so hard…



Movie News & Opinions

The RZA and Sacha Baron Cohen Join the Cast of Tarantino’s ‘Django Unchained’

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Quentin Tarantino’s newest project, Django Unchained, which is set to release on Christmas Day 2012, has gone through some cast changes (most notably Kevin Costner to Kurt Russell which I’m extremely thankful for), as well as some unexpected casting (Leonardo DiCaprio and Joseph Gordon-Levitt). Christoph Waltz, Samuel L. Jackson, Jamie Foxx, Kerry Washington, and James Remar are also names seen in the cast list, but the newest additions are by far the most surprising.

Former Wu-Tang member Robert Diggs, better known as RZA, has been cast as Thaddeus, a role that hasn’t had much news released about it. As well as that, Sacha Baron Cohen has been cast as Scotty, a role that also hasn’t had much disclosure. In fact, the entire film itself has thus far been kept under wraps relatively well, considering you haven’t read the PDF version of the script floating around the internet.

Be as skeptical as you want, but The RZA can act. Surprisingly well, I might add. Besides doing some of the soundtrack for the Kill Bill films, RZA’s face has been popping up in numerous projects like Coffee and Cigarettes, Funny People, American Gangster, Repo Men, Due Date, The Next Three Days, and most recently, A Very Harold and Kumar 3D Christmas. He’s known for being a scene-stealer, and there’s a good chance he’ll fulfill that duty in Django.

As far as Sacha Baron Cohen, we all know and love him from films like Borat, Bruno, Talladega Nights, the Madagascar movies, and Sweeney Todd. He’ll soon be starring in a new film called The Dictator (not to be confused as a remake of the 1940 Charlie Chaplin film, The Great Dictator), which will be directed by Borat/Bruno director, Larry Charles. Cohen will also be portraying Freddie Mercury in an upcoming and unnamed Queen biopic.

 

 

 

As for participating in Django, Cohen is a special kind of actor. This isn’t necessarily a bad thing, but if he’s in a movie, the role was most likely written for him, so seeing him in a Tarantino film leads me to think that his role will be not only extremely interesting, but hovering around genius. I trust both Cohen and Tarantino when it comes to successfully making great films, so there’s no reason that a collaboration between the two won’t be explosive.

Tarantino is known for his offbeat but almost always-successful casting, and with stars of this caliber, there’s no doubt in my mind that Django Unchained will be one of the best films of 2012.