Django Unchained Review

• 2nd Jan 2013

It’s between 2 ½ – 3 hours long, it features a cameo from its director, it features many colourful yet underdeveloped supporting characters, the Wilhelm scream is shoehorned into one of the many action set pieces and it’s probably going to get a few award nominations. No it isn’t The Hobbit, but Quentin Tarantino’s latest, Django Unchained!

A few years before the civil war in South America, Django (Jamie Foxx) is rescued from slavery by Dr King Schultz (Christoph Waltz). He agrees to help Schultz (a bounty hunter0 track down a trio of brothers in return for his freedom. But the partnership extends beyond this adventure as Schultz discovers that Django has a wife who (as they discover) is being held on a plantation by owner Calvin Candie (Leonardo DiCaprio). It’s then a case of hatching a clever rescue mission, but they must battle all kind of scum known to man along the way and use their wits to outsmart their opponents along the way.

Tarantino’s traits are here as you’d expect: the music is a variety of old and modern; he toys with dramatic zoom-ins; plays with film stock and yet somehow this manages to come off as his most ordinary narrative to date. Django is actually straight forward in its intentions (it just takes its time getting there and when it does get there it’s fairly small in its scope).

The real power of the film is in the performances. Christoph Waltz threatens to walk away with film and has the bulk of the best dialogue (and the majority of the charm). DiCaprio is good in the villain role despite being given a late entrance. Foxx is great but all too often is relegated to the background on too many occasions when he should be front and centre. The real surprise is Samuel L. Jackson’s head slave at Candie’s plantation. Clearly given the best entrance in the film with a very memorable glare that informs you right away of how cold a character this will be, but almost just as instantly he’s also given some of the funniest dialogue.

Wasted though are a myriad of supporting names like James Russo, Bruce Dern, Walton Goggins (whose role was apparently merged with one first earmarked for Kevin Costner/Kurt Russell – yet somehow only gets a few scenes with very little dialogue) and James Remar who mostly get little to do but look menacing and get shot at. The biggest standout from the support is probably Don Johnson who gets plenty enough screen time to make jokes, act as a threat and provide a bit of early excitement for the duo. He is also involved in perhaps the films funniest set-piece involving the Klan.

In the end it has the aspirations to go nuts like Kill Bill, shows little restraint in its violence (which often resorts to volcanic eruptions of blood), but in the end it’s killed by its lengthy run-time and extended ending. It’s not likely to stand above some of Mr T’s more prestigious works, but will likely entertain as another venture by the director into another piece of exploitation genre.

Steven Hurst