Couch Potato: 'Inglourious Basterds' is a tale of two Tarantinos
At least two movies inhabit Inglourious Basterds, Quentin
Tarantino's destroy-all-Nazis revenge fantasy that storms onto
DVD on Tuesday.  The good one is made up of lengthy cat-and-
mouse showdowns, carrying high stakes and featuring some of
Tarantino's best work. These verbal jousting sessions, including
the rightly celebrated charm offensive undertaken by Christoph
Waltz's SS Colonel Hans Landa in the film's opening moments,
show an uncanny knack for building tension to the absolute
breaking point. Tarantino has rarely been accused of subtlety,
but these scenes define the word.  Which brings us to the other
stuff. Brad Pitt with a Tennessee drawl, scalping Nazis (or
"Nahtzis"). Horror director Eli Roth, making an unfortunate
foray to the other side of the camera, crushing Nazi skulls with
a baseball bat and sending the craft of acting back to the Stone
Age. The, uh, hilarious sight of Nazis being burned alive in a
theater fire. Because theater