Inglorious Basterds and Fight Club can be as 'Postmodern' films in many ways. They both possess postmodern elements and can be compared with other postmodern films such as; 'Kick-Ass' and 'Scott Pilgrim vs. The World' because of this.
Inglorious Basterds, being a Quentin Tarentino movie, has numerous postmodern elements. It has lots of intertextual references throughout the text. Particular camera shots from 'The Good, The Bad and The Ugly' are used in Inglorious Basterds, for example, when they are in the bar and they have a Mexican Stand-off (which also came from The Good, The Bad and The Ugly/Spaghetti Western films). The scene in the cinema where Hitler gets shot, for me, had references to Scarface in the way they were continuously shooting at Hitler with Tommy guns. The film they watch at the cinema 'Nation's Pride' also has intertextual references to 'The Battleship Potemkin', like many films do, with the Odessa steps scene. It is also referenced when the soldier gets shot in the eye.
'Nation's Pride' itself is a postmodern element because it is a film-within-a-film.
Tarentino has a foot fetish, and he always includes a reference to feet in his films. In Kill Bill he has a scene where Una Thurman's character is wriggling her toes for the first time after being paralysed, this includes a series of close-ups on her feet, in Pulp Fiction he has a scene where Samuel L. Jackson and John Travolta's characters have a long conversation about a foot massage and in Inglorious Basterds, he includes the scene where a woman’s shoe is found by the German soldiers in the tavern after everybody is killed.
The music used throughout this film is taken from other films, another postmodern element. The majority of the music used in Inglorious Basterds is by Ennio Morricone who has produced hundreds of pieces of music for many films, most popularly, ‘The Good, The Bad and The Ugly’. Music in this film doesn’t fit with the time frame the film is set, because the film is set around the 1930’s/40’s as it is World War 2, but the music is taken from decades up to the 1980’s, for example, the David Bowie track used when Brigitte Von Hammersmark is getting ready.
Postmodern films, particularly Tarentino’s, like to remind the audience they are watching a film, which is a fantasy and not real. The film starts with a title, which reminds the audience that they are watching a film, that says ‘Once Upon A Time’ which links to the idea it is a fantasy because that’s how fairy tales start, and they are fantasies. The film is then split into chapters like a fairy tale, and the way it ends in a woods is a popular setting for fairy tales, Little Red Riding Hood for example.
Linking to theme of it being a fantasy, the ending of this film, baring in mind it’s supposed to be set in World War 2, is completely fictional. The American’s are made out to be heroes because the British soldier dies whilst the Americans kill Hitler when in actual fact, Hitler killed himself. By showing the Americans kill Hilter links the element that Tarentino wants his audience to know it is only a film, and isn’t real. This can also be linked to the acting in the way in which the accents are really enforced and over-the-top, for example, Aldo, Briggite Von Hammersmark, Hitler and any Englishman. Throughout the film some of the costumes remain perfect and unmarked despite laying on the floor etc. Brad Pitt’s character ‘Aldo’ is a perfect example of this as he has a sack over his head for some of the film but when it’s removed there isn’t one hair out of place, or a tiny spec of dirt on his white tuxedo despite having been on the floor in the middle of a woods.
Fight Club can be considered as a postmodern film for very different reasons Inglorious Basterds is because, unlike Tarentino who wants his audience to know what they are watching is a fantasy, David Fincher wanted to make Fight Club realistic to real life scenario’s. The film is successful in this by the way the violence is portrayed. Which is very hardcore, gory and sometimes a bit hard to watch. Throughout the film the fighting is shown in a realistic way in the way in which the men react how a real person would react in a fight rather than not be affected at all like in other films. This makes the violence visceral and more seemingly realistic I.e. the sound effects used in the fights. The film itself isn’t trying to be real, but by including the elements and effect that is does, that then makes it realistic.
Although the film is very realistic, Fincher also makes the audience aware it’s only a film when certain characters break the fourth wall and address the audience, for example when Ed Norton tells the audience about this cigarette burns on the screen. The scene where Ed Norton’s character is walking through his apartment flicking through an IKEA catalogue can be seen as postmodern too, because text appears on the screen like it would in an IKEA catalogue, labelling each object he has in his apartment, this also makes the audience aware they are watching a film, not real life. It makes the point that his life is all about possessions and that he is very materialistic- ‘what you own ends up owning you’ is a line said by Ed Norton’s character which links to the point about how pointless life is.
‘everything is a copy of a copy of a copy’ is said by Ed Norton’s character which is a postmodern statement, because all postmodern films copy other films e.g. Kick Ass with superhero movies. The subliminals that are revealed throughout the film could be seen as a ‘film-within-a-film’ like Inglorious Basterds because, when Tyler Durden works at the cinema he places a subliminal of a penis in a children’s movie so the people who are watching that are aware it’s a film that is being controlled by somebody, so when there are subliminal placed in Fight Club, the audience are made aware they are watching a film, not reality.
There aren’t many intetextual references in Fight Club, but there are little parts of the film where a connection can be made, an obvious one would be when Tyler says ‘run Forrest, run’ (a popular quote from the film Forrest Gump). Intertextual references could also be made when talking about the character of Marla Singer, because she isn’t a typical heroine that’s usually in films like this, because the film is very dark a typical ‘blonde-haired, big-boobed’ actress wouldn’t have fitted the role like Helena Bonham-Carter does because she is known for her quirkiness in many Tim Burton films, which are dark.
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