Review: Django Unchained

From the first ten minutes of Django Unchained, it is clear this is the work of Quentin Tarantino. Bloody, licentious, and highly entertaining, the film just doesn’t hold back.

Characteristically, Django Unchained is littered with film references and homages. Its title, in fact, is taken from director Sergio Corbucci’s 1966 film Django, banned in the UK for 25 years for its extreme violence. Just as brutal, Django Unchained follows a freed slave, Django (Jamie Foxx), and Dr. King Schultz (Christoph Waltz), a bounty hunter with a soft side, as they attempt to liberate Django’s wife, Broomhilda (Kerry Washington).

Set in the antebellum South, Django Unchained showcases sickening caricatures of plantation owners. One such is Calvin Candie (Leonardo DiCaprio), owner of ‘Candyland’ and Broomhilda. To free this beautiful fräulein, Django and Schultz must venture deep into Candie’s territory, witnessing countless horrors. Schultz freed Django in exchange for help tracking three fugitives – but throughout the film we watch their bond deepen. But both the sentimental and horrifying are cut through by cheesy musical cues and hilarious montages throughout. A particular favourite includes when Django, allowed to choose his own attire, emerges triumphantly from a dress shop to the tune of “I’ve got a name” by Jim Croce. The film is brilliantly scored.

What really makes this film, however, is its cast. Oscar winners Jamie Foxx and Christoph Waltz make a fantastic double act. While Foxx is appropriately unflashy, Waltz adds the perfect dose of charm and panache to his role. Samuel L. Jackson also shines as Stephen, a toady servant who maliciously positions himself as Candie’s favourite helper. More haunting is Leonardo DiCaprio’s performance as Calvin Candie, who’s involved in scenes of incessent gruesome bloodshed and tacit racial bigotry.

In spite of Tarantino’s recent outburst and refusal to elaborate on the boundless violence of his films, Django’s brutality has a purpose. It’s used to provoke and assail viewers with the barbarity of slavery in 19th-century America. Of course, it’s not a historically accurate representation but it doesn’t need to be. Tarantino wanted to shock audiences and raise questions about slavery, and that’s just what he’s done. While the film’s dialogue is showered with racial epithets, Tarantino never shies away from capturing the suffering of the enslaved and he does so without any emphatic moral overtones. What is perhaps most refreshing about Django Unchained is that it’s fearless in breaking taboo – here, ‘regenerative violence’ is used by blacks against whites – what was the last film you saw that did that? Tarantino further dares to tackle the ‘Uncle Tom’ figure in Stephen, the slave whose servility has morphed into beastliness.

However, Django Unchained is not without flaw. From about two hours in, the film becomes incredibly self-indulgent. Tarantino’s penchant for a good bloodbath negates the truths he’s portrayed and the film goes out on a tide of retributive, yet somehow unconvincing, slaughter. But for those who don’t care for restraint, Django Unchained is an entertaining success, revealing an American past that contemporary Hollywood so often ignores. It’s a bloody but rewarding three hours.