CHRISTMAS GIFT GUIDE
DECEMBER 8: ACTION & ADVENTURE

Thanks for bearing with us as we counted down to the last of our 9 categories! Action & Adventure saw some cracking releases this year, but this is what we think will keep Santa's elves busy over the next couple of weeks.

THE WINNER: 

Monkey Score: 94%

What we loved about it:

1. Cinema won the war - nice twist!

2. Full of moments just as cringe-worthy as the Mr Blonde / ear thing

3. It gave us hope that there are some great movies left in ol' QT

Inglorious Basterds (out 7 December 09, Cert.18)

Brad Pitt, Melanie Laurent, Eli Roth, Christoph Waltz, dir. Quentin Tarentino, 2009, cert.18

What it's about:

France, 1941. Southern Boy Lt. Aldo Raine leads a motley squad of Jewish-American soldiers, the "Basterds", whose sole purpose is to instill terror within the Third Reich ranks by killing & scalping 100 nazis each. Meanwhile Shosanna Dreyfus, who escaped death as a child at the hands of Waffen-SS Colonel Landa aka the "Jew Hunter", is plotting her revenge. She is planning to torch the cinema she owns on the night of a prestigious premiere attended by Hitler, Goebbels, Goering and Bormann.

What MovieMonkeys thought:

The last few releases from Quentin Tarentino had left us rather unimpressed so we had few expectations for Basterds. We're happy to report that we were spectacularly wrong. Basterds is not just good - it's brilliant. First of all the film looks great - the cinematography is beautiful, managing to give the picture a look somewhere between European arthouse and Hollywood glamour. Then the structure: the story is told in five separate chapters, reminding us of Pulp Fiction and how Tarentino had turned the film on its head to create a very original and effective narrative. Things get really interesting, however, on the story front: you realise pretty quickly that Basterds is not just another World War II movie. Tarentino took the stance that the movie doesn't have to end like the book, and went on to re-imagine the outcome of the war. It's different, it's fresh and it works: Inglorious Basterds is a hugely entertaining war flick with a twist. Tarentino's best film since Pulp Fiction.