Half-Assed Internet Research
Hellstrom's King Kong theory is Tarantino's own from Fresh Air; the opening title card is Tarantino's handwriting; the screenplay sets Aldo's briefing in England and explains his neck scar as a survived lynching; Donny Donowitz is the father of True Romance's Lee Donowitz and Aldo is suggested as Floyd's great-grandfather; Eli Roth directed Nation's Pride; the marquee film is Clouzot's Le Corbeau; Zoller is based on Audie Murphy; Goebbels's Lilian Harvey tantrum reflects her 1939 flight from Germany; Landa's rat speech draws on The Eternal Jew; von Hammersmark is based partly on Zarah Leander; Tarantino said discovering Waltz gave him his movie; Hickox quotes Cole Porter and Villon
In the discussion (7)
Approx. transcript time · 01:04:46Read transcript
- Hellstrom's King Kong theory is Tarantino's own from his Terry Gross interview, and the opening title card is in Tarantino's handwriting; the screenplay reveals that the 'I want my scalps' briefing takes place in England and that the ligature marks on Aldo's neck come from a survived lynching, a common punishment in the 20s and 30s, which also references Tuco in The Good, the Bad and the Ugly.
- Lee Donowitz and Donnie Donowitz are related, and Aldo is assumed or suggested to be the great-grandfather of Floyd from True Romance; Eli Roth, the horror director of Hostel, directed Nation's Pride, the film within the film.
- The movie Shoshana takes down off the marquee is Henri-Georges Clouseau's (as transcribed) Le Corbeau, a famous 40s French film with hidden anti-Nazi messages; the Audie Murphy basis for Zoller is a clever subversion of the American ideal of heroism applied to a German soldier.
- Goebbels throws a tantrum at Francesca's mention of Lillian Harvey because Harvey fled Nazi Germany in 1939 after helping the Jewish choreographer Jens Keith escape to Switzerland; Landa's rats speech to the farmer is influenced by The Eternal Jew, an SS propaganda film made in Poland that depicted Jews as disease-spreading rats; Hammersmark is based somewhat on Zara Leander (as transcribed), a Swedish actress said to have been a Russian spy; this is less half-assed research than World War II history.
- Tarantino has said that discovering Waltz gave him his movie, since he had come to fear the role was literally unplayable, and he was resistant to Leo speaking English with a German accent for two and a half hours.
- Hickox is literate and literary: 'Paris when it sizzles' is a lyric from a Cole Porter song, and 'like the snows of yesteryear' comes from a Villon poem (attributed in the episode to Jacques Villon), heady stuff for a Tarantino movie that still feels true to the character.
- Earlier, during the tavern discussion, a host borrows a piece of half-assed research: the King Kong scene is Tarantino's theory from Fresh Air, and his Top Gun theory would have been anachronistic.