Review: The Inglorious Bastards

A WWII film set in occupied France, our protagonists are five Allied soldiers with sullied reputations for various reasons (Peter Hooten, Fred Williamson, Bo Svenson, Jackie Basehart, and Michael Pergolani). The transport they’re being shipped in while under military arrest is attacked by Nazis, and our dirty five decide to make a run for it. Later, a sticky situation sees them inadvertently stumble upon a deadly undercover mission masterminded by American officer Ian Bannen (!). They decide to take it upon themselves to carry out the mission instead. A suicide mission at that.

 

B-move loving filmmaker Quentin Tarantino took the title and basic rag-tag military platoon theme from this 1978 war-action pic for his terrific “Inglourious Basterds” (so-titled because of a misspelling of this film’s title), so don’t go looking for too many similarities here. This flick from director Enzo G. Castellari (“The New Barbarians”, “Street Law”) is basically a moderately budgeted Italian-made B-movie, whereas Tarantino took the basics and turned it into his own blend of exploitation movie and somewhat more epic production. This one’s all the basics, and on that level it’s simplistically enjoyable. Call it a lesser “Dirty Dozen” with a touch of “Kelly’s Heroes” with Bo Svenson doing Lee Marvin in “The Dirty Dozen” or Telly Savalas in “Kelly’s Heroes” and Fred Williamson doing Jim Brown in “The Dirty Dozen”. Both actors were nearing the end of their B-movie stardom here and they make for a fun team. Fellow American Peter Hooten is a lesser-known name, though he made several Italian films in the 70s and 80s. He’s quite good too as the token racist, though his charisma is a lot lesser than the two bigger stars here.

 

I mentioned that this is quite similar to “The Dirty Dozen” and “Kelly’s Heroes” (there’s also elements of “The Great Escape” and “Bridge on the River Kwai”), but what it most reminded me of was the machine-gun antics of TV’s “The A-Team” (which I love) and the films made by The Cannon Group, home to nearly every Chuck Norris and Michael Dudikoff action film of the 80s. So if that’s your bag, you’ll find this one an easy watch. What I liked here in this action-packed film is that the battles are so frequent that it really shows you just how dangerous war actually is. Unlike a lot of war films from the 50s through to the 70s, you actually get the sense of constant danger for soldiers. The body count is ridiculously high. Even the chicks are packing heat here, in a rather amusing moment (Gratuitous nudity has never been more gleefully gratuitous). For the budget, this is actually pretty well-staged stuff even if you’re wondering just how on earth these guys aren’t running out of ammo. It all ends on a priceless explosive self-sacrificing climax. The model work isn’t entirely convincing there, but it’s still bloody marvellous.

 

If there’s a flaw it comes from a surprising source. Scottish actor Sir Ian Bannen is usually a standout in any film he appears. Unfortunately here he’s unhelpfully cast as an American officer and he has also been very obviously dubbed by someone else to sound American. I reckon there’s a couple of seconds of Bannen’s real voice in there, but for the most part he just sounds blatantly ridiculous and is miscast in the role otherwise anyway. On the plus side, the music score by Francesco De Masi (“The Arena”, “Kid Vengeance”, “The New York Ripper”, “Lone Wolf McQuade”) is top-notch.

 

Quite clearly a B-movie, but for what it is it’s action-packed fun, and full of machismo. Easily recommended to the so inclined.

 

Rating: B-