Django Unchained

[Ginger]

From what I've read, during slavery "Negro" "darkie" "boy" was used to refer to slaves. The n-word was mostly used after the Civil War as a slur.

They just had a 12-hour Roots marathon on BET, which I'd never seen before, and the n-word was used constantly throughout. I can't vouch for the historical accuracy of Roots but I assumed based on reputation that it was.

IIRC, the n-word was not used at all in Inglourious Basterds. Landa referred to Marcel with the French Nègre which translates most closely to "negro" but with an additional slavery connotation.

[bklynred]

Aw crap, I wanted to see Roots!

ETA: By no means was the n-word my only issue with this movie. I disliked it (I'm realizing as time passes) for a number of reasons. The switching between absurdist comedy and OTT violence and horrific slave narrative was too much to bear, YMMV. And having to watch QT in a scene for 10 minutes was painful, he has a face for radio. It pulled me out of the movie, as well as the "humor." I was also really not chuckling at the klan scene. Just because revenge is involved doesn't forgive all that came before it.

[chonies]

I agree, the Tarantino part of that scene was annoying. It took me right out--the Australian part was just too wtf, after everything else, although it was probably fatigue by that point. For me, though, the rest of that scene was fairly compelling--Django outwitted the miners with what I thought was a loose end, and then when the doors of the wagon were wide open, the men had to be coaxed to leave? It reminded me a lot of Kindred, by Octavia Butler, and the questions raised by Dana.

Also, reference question--part of the QT cameo involved a buh? kind of reference to Crocodile Dundee, which I know was also really referential to its own ancestors, but throughout the miners' scene, I was wondering what I was missing. Anyone have any information on that?

[bklynred]

I thought of that book as well! I'm reading something else of hers now, she's definitely on my mind.

Vulture put up an A-Z primer[/color]. Needless to say, spoilers etc. etc.

[chonies]

Dec 30, 2012 0:30:33 GMT -4 bklynred said:

I thought of that book as well! I'm reading something else of hers now, she's definitely on my mind.

Vulture put up an A-Z primer

[/color]. Needless to say, spoilers etc. etc.[/quote]

Thank you! I LOVE this sort of thing. So glad for the internet and culturally savvy people.

And also? What Butler book are you reading?

[bklynred]

Me too! I hope some more crop up. I'm actually reading Tananarive Due, My Soul to Take.

[Hamatron]

My people! I was wondering if this movie was going to be to slavery what IB was to the Holocaust. I have a friend who LOVED IB, and she looks like she is about to punch me whenever I say that I didn't think IB was the most brilliant movie EVER MADE. I just couldn't suspend disbelief, and rewriting the Holocaust is problematic. I get that it's basically supposed to be revenge porn. I guess I am not that into revenge porn (I hated Kill Bill too, hah). Yeah. I just couldn't do it.

I will probably end up seeing DU, but not in the theater. Sometimes I really like Tarantino (Jackie Brown was great), but I suspect I am not going to be into this one.

[ijustworkhere]

Alrighty, so I'm going to be the first one in the thread to say that I fricking loved this movie. The writing and acting were terrific, and I feel like Tarantino has inadvertently hit his stride with these period films, because he's like a kid in a candy shop when it comes to setting. There's so much detail and he obviously has so much fun recreating history. (This is not to say it's all completely historically accurate--just that the world he builds is incredibly intricate and well-planned.)

The one big flaw was, I felt, in the pacing. Narratively, there was a point where the rhythm of the story felt like it was at its natural end, but Tarantino obviously wanted to get a few more good scenes in. The story sort of went off the rails for a bit at the end so that he could do so, and then righted itself for the final scene. I think some judicious editing by fresh eyes was in order. It's not that any of the material bad, just that the story structure fell apart and got confusing for a bit before wrapping up.

I completely disagree with Spike Lee and anyone else saying that the grisly, disturbing nature of the film and the constant n-word constituted exploitation for entertainment's sake. I felt that this was one of the most honest (again, not accurate; honest) renditions of slavery I've ever seen. Tarantino didn't give us easy cardboard villains and Greek Chorus characters spouting off anachronistic "but slavery is actually bad, guys" speeches, telling us what to think and how to feel about it. Rather, he just laid it out there for us to see, the disgusting guts of slavery, all out on the table, no filter, and didn't let up the whole movie. Like he was saying, take a good, long look, people, this is what it was. I thought it was brilliant.

[jynni]

I'm sorry, but how did IB rewrite the Holocaust other than killing off Hitler and ending the war ten months earlier? Yeah, it presented a "what if" scenario but it didn't imply any changes to the actual atrocities that happened up to that point (mid-1944).

I guess I just don't have a problem with alternate history/"what if" stories. They're just like any other type of fiction.

[Hamatron]

Okay, fair enough. It rewrote how Hitler's death played out, which is pretty big. Also, I said that I couldn't suspend disbelief. That doesn't mean I think people who could and enjoyed the film are wrong. Like I said, revenge flicks just aren't my thing.