Django Unchained - 2012 - 3 Stars

Actors:  Jamie Foxx, Christoph Waltz
Director:  Quentin Tarantino

It's neat to see a film where you think 'Only one person could have made this movie.'  Django Unchained is a singular vision, a whirlwind of constant motion and violence.  Beyond that, Tarantino is still a master of creating tension through dialogue and dramatic irony.  He is also not a master of reining himself in - 150 minutes of this near-mythical story hung on characters who are barely 2 dimensional is certainly a nod to Leone and Peckinpah, but not a good one.  The film loses all tension in the final 20 minutes as the film glories in its own ethos some more.

Part of me finds Quentin Tarantino the person so amusing that when I see a really creative setpiece in one of his films, I just imagine him excitedly explaining it to whoever's around him.