Of Bear Jews and Basterds

A string of recent movies that have portrayed 'Strong Jews' have raised questions about the nature of Jewish victimhood and conflict. Munich did so consciously; Defiance did so rather unintentionally. I was looking forward to seeing Inglorious Basterds more than either, and I wasn't sure why until I saw the film.

As a boy, I loved watching war films like A Bridge Too Far, Guns of Navarone, The Great Escape, The Longest Day and countless others. Quentin Tarantino clearly did as well, and Inglorious Basterds is the Jewsploitation version. Surely he, or at the very least the Weinstein brothers who produced the film, knew that every Jew in America would pay their $10 to watch Jewish toughs take out Hitler. It is Jewish porn with one hell of a money shot.

Thankfully, Tarantino also made a very entertaining film. I enjoyed the movie. Its well made with Tarantino's requisite dialogue perfection and fine performances by Christopher Walz as the 'Jew Hunter' and Michele Laurent as Shoshana Dreyfus. Brad Pitt and Michael Fassbender are also fun to watch, though the 'Basterds' themselves are less memorable than the Dirty Dozen, the exception being the hilariously named 'Bear Jew,' however forgettably portrayed by Eli Roth.

But as Tablet points out, a Jewish film this was not. "Vengence is Mine, says the Lord." These Jews did not consider even momentarily the wine they might have once split on Seder plates to lessen their joy. They may not have even viewed the Germans as their contemporary Amalekites as they sadistically killing, scalping and misfiguring the enemy. And there's a reason for that.

The film is less about a reversal of power roles between Jews and Nazis than about the power of film itself. Central to the plot is movie within a movie, a fictional German propaganda film called Triumph of the Spirit, during the screening of which a theater full of Nazis gleefully cheer on its sniper hero as he kills out over 300 American G.I.'s.

As Basterds' own plot unfolds into its climactic finish, we watch those Nazis, including the leaders of the Third Reich, gunned down, trapped in the theater to burn and blown up by avenging Jews. Every Holocaust film image is turned on its head, and the whole audience cheers. I realized at that moment that the experience of this entire movie is on a parallel trajectory to the film, which in the end comments not just on the plot and myriad homages to other cinema classics, but endlessly on itself and its audience.

The real, seldom-heard story of post-war Jewish revenge by Abba Kovner's Dam Yehudi Nakam to poison 6 million Germans through the water supply was foiled... by the Israeli government. It felt the immorality of such an act would cheapen the tragedy and lower the Jewish people to the level of the Nazis. Reality is always far more complex than our fantasy.

And that's why Inglorious Basterds' is so enjoyable. We momentarily dismiss the moralism, sobriety and senselessness of the Holocaust's hellish nature as portrayed in other WWII films and as watch our fictional fathers, uncles and cousins take out our actual relatives' rage on those we most love to hate.

Benigni's Life is Beautiful made us laugh through our tears. Spielberg just made us cry with Schindler's List. Grey Zone and Ghetto reminded the world we did not go quietly. The Pianist is equally reverential. Tarantino's self-referential and somewhat two dimensional Basterds remind us just why we go to the movies. To forget reality and see our wildest dreams play out on-screen as Jews exact revenge on Hitler.

Unfortunately, its only a movie. Pure fantasy. But you know what they say about Jews and Hollywood.