To say that Quentin Tarantino is a movie fan is a bit like saying Paris Hilton likes attention — it’s not only obvious but a gross understatement.  Whether you like his work or not, this high school dropout-turned video clerk-turned cinéaste-turned auteur makes wholly unique films. But the paradox is that virtually every scene he writes is either directly informed or influenced in some way by other films. It has been his life’s work to elevate the deliciously schlocky (or unbearably banal, depending your inclination) pulp he cherished in his youth into the realm of substantive, nuanced, legitimate cinema. And in large part, he’s succeeded. His latest exploit, the multi-layered, picaresque Jewish revenge flick, “Inglourious Basterds,” is, among other things, the culmination of one man’s love affair with cinema.

With an opening chapter drenched in classic and spaghetti western homages, notably John Ford’s “The Searchers,” and Sergio Leone’s “Once Upon a Time in the West,” a mid-section riddled with tributes to Jean Luc-Godard and German Expressionists like Paul Wegener and Fritz Lang, a third act that invokes George Orwell’s “1984,” Howard Hawks’ “Sargeant York,” and Jacques Tourneur’s and Paul Schrader’s versions of “Cat People” respectively, and an entire premise based on Enzo G. Castellari’s “The Inglorious Bastards,” which itself is based on Robert Aldrich’s “The Dirty Dozen,” Tarantino not only rewrites the Second World War but encapsulates, distills, and reworks virtually the entire history of cinema into an audacious, riveting, revisionist’s fairy-tale in under 160 minutes.

Of course, references to other films or literature alone, sans context, don’t result in great cinema.  But the ingenious, intricately thrilling way that Tarantino subtly — and sometimes not so subtly — weaves hundreds of disparate narratives, eras, sensibilities, genres, and themes into a brilliantly realized, masterfully rendered work of art is an unparalleled feat.  The Basterds aren’t the heroes here, film is.  And that’s no metaphor, actual film stock itself becomes the literal hero of this movie in a thrilling climax that takes place in — you guessed it — a cinema.

But as pervasive as the idea of film’s effects on real events and political, racial, and socio-economic issues is throughout “Inglourious Basterds,” it is but one of this clever onion’s many layers.  Let’s take a look at the idea of identity, for example.  Virtually every character is hiding something.  Nothing is as it seems.  Think of the theater owner, Shosanna (Mélanie Laurent) for instance, who’s been living incognito her entire life, or Lt. Archie Hicox (Michael Fassbender), who blows his cover as a German officer with a three-fingered gesture, or Aldo Raine (Brad Pitt) whose briefs mentions of a civilian life in Tennessee combined with that telling scar around his neck reveal a dark past. Even the settings themselves have secrets. The very first scene, which may be the best thing Tarantino has ever shot,  sets the stage.  While an unbearably tense Mexican Standoff rages above, the farmhouse reveals its secret below the floorboards.  Later, the cinema itself becomes a deceptive character with secrets in both the projection room and behind the screen. And let’s not forget about the ubiquitous usage of language as an agent of deceit. Deception proves to be a powerful tool in Tarantino’s hands, employed largely to illuminate and contextualize the role of identity in the human experience.

“Inglourious Basterds” has taken a lot of heat for it’s most controversial theme: revenge.  Not only revenge, but how this particular depiction of Jewish revenge alters documented history and, in effect, can be said to deny the Holocaust.  That conclusion may be drawn by some intelligent, discerning viewers, but is ultimately the result of projecting a nefarious glare on the narrative that simply isn’t there.  The film’s deliberate construction and overarching themes suggest quite the opposite.  Tarantino, infamous for his fantastical, ultra-excessive bloodthirst, once again invites us to join the party. We happily oblige, and just at that moment when we begin to feel the primal urges of savagery, and crave vengeance, he turns on us and condemns our gleeful, violent indulgences.  Has the bad boy of cinema suddenly had a change of heart?  Has he gotten bogged down in the circular banality of moral relativism?  I don’t think so.  The difference here is the nature of the violence.  The cartoonish and excessive violence of the “Kill Bill” films isn’t representative of any conceivable reality and is employed purely as an element of aesthetics.  Here, the violence is brutal and horrific. Tarantino is reminding us of the difference between film and reality.  Sure, cheer on the hilariously gratuitous violence in film, but make no mistake, real violence has real consequences.  For if cinema becomes a place where we can no longer indulge in humanity’s greatest aspirations or its most vile of urges, it will have lost its purpose.