Quentin Tarantino’s Django Unchained made its cinematic debut in 2012, featuring legendary actors Jamie Foxx, Christoph Waltz, and Leonardo DiCaprio. Tarantino pays homage to old-timey spaghetti western’s as he used brighter-than-real-life colors and a cheesy musical score to portray his tale of an unlikely friendship between a slave and a bounty hunter. Jamie Foxx portrays the slave, named Django, that is freed by bounty hunter ,Dr. King Shultz (Christoph Waltz), in order to assist him in claiming a bounty. Yet, the two form an unlikely bond and set off to free Django’s wife, Hildy, (Kerry Washington) from the notorious slave-owner, Calvin Candie (Leonardo DiCaprio).

Tarantino’s Django Unchained is a cinematic masterpiece that captures the realities of slavery like no other previous director. By using a mix of close-up shots and color to highlight each scene, Tarantino is able to capture the slaves’ perspective. For example, the film fades in to a scene of a group of slaves walking in a line, attached to a row of chains and shackles. The first shot is of the slaves feet, highlighting their bare feet and bloody ankles. The next shot shows the slaves’ visible breath in the frigid, night air as they cling dearly to the feeble rags draped around them. Right away, the audience is shocked with an image of a horrific condition for a human to live in,immediately arousing sympathy in the audience. This sympathetic move causes the audience to immediately befriend Dr. Shultz when he arrives, kills one of the slave owners, traps the other under a horse, frees the slaves, and leaves with Django accompanying him.

Tarantino also effectively uses color and lighting to portray that the movie is from Django’s perspective. There are multiple flashback scenes to prior plantations that Django worked on. During these flashbacks the lighting and color is unrealistically vibrant, revealing every ugly feature on the plantation owners. The only times Django is shown in these flashbacks, his eyes are often shown large in the screen, revealing only his emotions in the scene. For instance, one scene flashing back on when Django and his wife were about to be branded with runaway R’s for attempting to escape, the entire scene is shown from Django’s perspective sitting down with the face of the plantation owner looming directly above, emphasizing his evil, malicious smile. The lighting also highlighted his old wrinkled face, giving his face a red, devilish tint.

Yet, Tarantino’s directive genius would be irrelevant had the acting not been absolutely outstanding. In one scene, while Django, Schultz, and Mr. Candie are discussing the sale of Django’s wife, Hildy, DiCaprio (Candie) passionately slams his fist against the table, breaking a piece of glass and severely cutting his hand (this was not planned, DiCaprio actually cut his hand). Next, in a brilliant stroke of acting genius, DiCaprio rubs his bloody hand across Kerry Washington’s (Hildy) face, revealing Dicaprio’s character’s maniacal insanity, and Hildy’s horrific fear of her owner. Had this scene been scripted, it really would not have had the same effect; this huge, candid act by DiCaprio completely encapsulated the film, which is reaffirmed when DiCaprio proposes that he will only sell Hildy, a meager “comfort” girl for $12,000. This situation implicitly reveals that greed that backs capitalism; human well-being is pushed to the side when a large sum of money is involved.

Not only does the film feature brilliant camera-work and acting, but the narrative structure of Django Unchained is very intelligent. The specific narrative, the Hero’s Journey, is commonly used in film, but Tarantino has Dr. Schultz foreshadow the plot’s development near the beginning of the film. Schultz explains an ancient German fairy tale to Django which tells the story of a German Princess banished to the top of a mountain, guarded by a dragon, and surrounded by Hell fire. Out of love, a knight slays the dragon and walks through Hell fire to save the princess. Django scales the mountain (tricks Mr. Candie into friendly admittance into his plantation). Slays the dragon (Schultz kills Mr. Candie and Django kills his problematic head house slave), and walks through Hell Fire to save his princess. In the last scene, Django quite literally walks through a bit of fire before escaping with his beloved Hildy.

At the beginning of the film, Tarantino use’s narrative structure to foreshadow the way the film develops, but uses the score to foreshadow specific scenes in the movie. For example, as Django and Dr. Schultz are walking towards Candie Land (Calvin Candie’s plantation) with a large group of Candie’s men, Rick Ross’s “100 Black Coffins” begins to play. The song starts of with a beat that combines whistles and drums, much like drummer boy’s maintaining a beat as an army marches into battle. Next, the chorus begins with the phrase, “I need a hundred black coffins for a hundred bad men, a hundred black graves to lay they ass in.” The opening of this song foreshadows an epic battle scene inside of Candie’s house between Django and Candie’s goons. While Django does not win at first, he blows up the house, killing the hundred bad men. Despite taking place in the 19th Century, the score is very modern, highlighting the fact the the movie implicitly touches on modern issues; racism and problems that have arisen from contemporary capitalism.

Overall, Quentin Tarantino’s Django Unchained isa cinematic masterpiece that combines excellent camerawork, mis en scene elements, marvelous acting, musical score, and a beautiful narrative to tell a fantastic story. While traditional spaghetti western’s were did not contain the best cinematic elements, Tarantino’s film, while following a simple, linear narrative is packed with layers and layers of subtext that will mesmerize audiences time after time again!

References:

“100 Black Coffins.” Django Unchained (Original Motion Picture Soundtrack). Various Artists (2012).

Barsam, R and Monahan, D. Looking at Movies. New York: W.W. Norton and Company, Inc, 2016. Print

Django Unchained. Dir. Quentin Tarantino. Columbia Pictures (2012). Film.

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1853728/