With only nine feature films under his belt, Quentin Tarantino has amassed over fifty worthy contenders for the best character he’s ever created. And there are a lot of choices that few would argue with — Jules and Vincent, Beatrix Kiddo, Calvin Candie — but for the director himself, there is one he feels tops them all.
Attending the opening of the Jerusalem Film Festival, Tarantino shared what he felt was his best big screen creation, and it’s choice that wouldn’t find much argument.
“Landa is the best character I’ve ever written and maybe the best I ever will write,” he said about the villain of his WWII flick “Inglourious Basterds,” played to Oscar winning glory by Christoph Waltz. “I didn’t realize [when I was first writing him] that he was a linguistic genius. He’s probably one of the only Nazis in history who could speak perfect Yiddish.”
In fact, Landa was so hard to cast– he needed to find an actor who could speak fluent German, French and Italian — Tarantino admitted he almost scrapped “Inglourious Basterds.” “I was getting worried. Unless I found the perfect Landa, I was going to pull the movie,” he revealed. “I gave myself one more week and then I was going to pull the plug. Then Christoph Waltz came in and it was obvious that he was the guy; he could do everything. He was amazing, he gave us our movie back.”
Certainly, the baddie is a memorable one among Tarantino’s rogues gallery of characters, and it’s a choice many would agree with. Will he ever top it? Even the director seems doubtful, and with one picture left in his arsenal, it may be his crowning character achievement. As you might recall, Tarantino has long been talking about retiring from filmmaking after his tenth feature, and turning his creative juices to other projects like plays or books, however, he’s leaving the door open to return behind the camera.
“I am planning to stop at 10 [films], but at 75 I might decide I have another story to do,” he said.
And honestly, with a guy as endlessly restless and bursting with ideas as Tarantino, I really wouldn’t be surprised if winds up directing more than ten features.
Let us know your favorite Tarantino character in the comments section. [via Screen Daily]