WHAT I’VE BEEN WATCHING: Inglourious Basterds

I want everyone who sees it to be as surprised as I was, so I’m just going to keep it brief: it ranks just below Jackie Brown as my favorite Quentin Tarantino movie, a great meditation on the power of cinema. With dialogue and performances that are honed to a fine polish buoying a plot that’s much greater than the marketing campaign indicates, Basterds is funny, smart, and willing to defy expectations left and right.