"Inglourious Basterds" fans will remember the heroic Nazi soldier Frederick Zoller (played by Daniel Brühl) standing alone on a tower and shooting
several Allied soldiers, becoming a legendary figure in the film within the film "Stolz der Nation" ("Nation's Pride"). Though only bits and pieces of that
appear in Tarantino's film, the whole short film was released on "Inglourious" Dvd as bonus material, a short film directed by Eli Roth which captures the
essence of German cinema from the Goebbels era. Result: a fun war movie that has the style of the 1940's but the rhythm of current cinema, almost like
"Saving Private Ryan". And once again Mr. Brühl is excellent as the lone hero (here he speaks mostly in German).
Obviously you don't get to see a whole feature film, it's just a glimpse of the movie presented in "Inglorious Basterds" but it's worth seeing anyway.
Lone wolf Zoller is seen firing his rifle against several soldiers, a complete war zone where you can see the man's pain, agony, angry, and even some sense
of fulfillment. Yet Roth's film always finds a way to include humored moments such as a spoof to the classic scene from "Battleship Potemkin" where a baby
stroller stands between the shooting (also a spoof on "The Dead Zone" movie when the soldier holds the baby to protect himself from Zoller's attack); and
the hilarious moment where several Allied soldier manage to create a perfect swastika from their bullets on Zoller's tower but
they cannot find a way to hit the guy. Amazing.
Entertainment is the key here, and because Quentin needed this device for his incredible story. I know Eli Roth is fully devoted to the horror genre
but I honestly think he should give it a try to make a full feature war film. With this project you can evidence that he has an eye for aesthetics, knows
how to edit altogether and present a valuable film. Another thing that makes this film more interesting is that Roth made a behind the scenes where Julie Dreyfus
and the actor who played Goebbels in Quentin's film make their comments about "Nation's Pride" and Roth plays the film director Alois von Eichberg, a
hystercial and funny performance where he looks like a veteran bossy director talking about his movie (the German accent is hilarious). I saw it on
YouTube but couldn't find more information about it elsewhere (except for a wiki site dedicated to "Inglourious" but there's isn't a source where it was
released neither technical aspects, cast and crew. It's shorter than the short but quite realistic as well. Thumbs up to all three projects. 9/10
P.S.: 10 years down the road!
