( CNN ) -- When the British comedian Spike Milligan wrote a memoir about his experiences during World War II , he called it `` Adolf Hitler : My Part in His Downfall . '' Eli Roth and Brad Pitt play some bloodthirsty Allied soldiers in `` Inglourious Basterds . '' Unlike Milligan , Quentin Tarantino was born 40 years too late to have played an active role in that enterprise , but at least he shares Milligan 's chutzpah . Beginning with the precaution `` Once upon a time in Nazi-Occupied France ... '' -- part homage to Sergio Leone , part disclaimer of historical authenticity -- `` Inglourious Basterds '' does n't pretend to give us the war as it was , but as it should have been . In this outrageous revisionist revenge fantasy , not only do the Jews resist Hitler -- in the form of a crack U.S. guerrilla unit operating behind enemy lines and outside official jurisdiction -- but they terrorize the German army with the bloodcurdling ferocity of their reprisals . When Brad Pitt 's drawling Lt. Aldo Raine tells his platoon of misfits and sociopaths that each owes him 100 German scalps , it 's not an idle pleasantry . Despite Pitt 's sadism , this `` Dirty Dozen '' redux -- inspired by Enzo Castellari 's 1978 exploitation film `` The Inglorious Bastards '' -- turns out to be the sketchiest component in an unexpectedly elaborate design dominated by Christoph Waltz 's arch villain , Col. Hans Landa . Watch the stars talk about making the movie » . Waltz will be unknown to most American audiences -- he was certainly unknown to me -- but he 's nothing less than sensational as the silky , polyglot SS officer charged by the Fuhrer to root out the remaining Jews in France . The long , long first sequence -- or `` chapter , '' as Tarantino terms it -- is essentially a 20-minute-plus two-character scene between Landa and a French farmer ( played by Denis Menochet ) , where the SS man most graciously presumes on his host 's wary hospitality , flattering him and his family , even complimenting his milk . The man is a tease , but a deadly one . With every perfectly enunciated phrase , he turns the screws tighter and tighter , up to the point where the poor farmer is ready to tell him everything . It 's a masterful scene , bleakly comic and incredibly suspenseful , and as bold in its way as anything Tarantino has done before . ( Who starts an adventure movie with 30 pages of dialogue ? ) Before it is done , we have developed a powerful antipathy to this brilliant , vicious fellow , Landa ; it is clear that , like so many of the most memorable screen villains , he is a man we will love to hate . Tarantino does n't hold back on nasty Nazis -- Goebbels and Hitler also figure , as well as Frederick Zoller ( Daniel Bruhl ) , a handsome young infantryman and movie buff who has become a national hero after shooting more than a hundred GIs , and who is now starring as himself in Goebbels ' latest propaganda film . On the other side of the equation , we find a glamorous German movie star who is actually an agent for the Allies ( Diane Kruger as Bridget von Hammersmark ) and Michael Fassbender as a British agent , Lt. Archie Hicox , sent as a liaison between Bridget and the `` Basterds '' because of his background as a film critic . ( Only in a Tarantino movie do you find heroic critics . ) And then there 's Shosanna Dreyfus ( the excellent Melanie Laurent ) , improbably the owner-operator of a Parisian movie theater , the site on which all the major characters -- including der Fuhrer -- converge for Zoller 's premiere . In this film , the cinema is everywhere and everything . For two and a half hours in the dark , anything goes . Some critics have taken exception to this hubris , even on moral grounds . Yet the movies have always exploited war and plundered history . Tarantino is just more up front about repurposing it than most . That first scene is no anomaly . Words speak louder than action , and most of the brutality comes veiled in cagey cat-and-mouse conversation . It 's so intricately constructed , sometimes , that the film threatens to turn into a screenwriting master class and you wish Tarantino would just get on with the plot . But then , of course , he does , and engineers the kind of climax that threatens to bring the house down . `` Inglourious Basterds '' may or may not get Tarantino 's career ( and its producers , The Weinstein Company ) back on track . It 's hard to see it converting many skeptics , but the filmmaker 's fans should be more than satisfied , and curious newbies will discover a dense , literate , audacious and prodigious talent , still one of the best of his generation . `` Inglourious Basterds '' is rated R and runs 152 minutes . For Entertainment Weekly 's review , click here .
` ` Inglourious ' '' a twist on war movies by Quentin Tarantino , says Variety . CNN.com 's Tom Charity : ' opens with masterful scene , sustains tension . ` ` ' '' stars Brad Pitt as Nazi hunter , Christoph Waltz as villain .