Another point some critics are making hay out of is the presence of a new editor on Django Unchained. The passing of long-time collaborator Sally Menke meant Tarantino had to work with a new editor for this film, Fred Raskin. This possible slight change in rhythm and cutting led a few to the conclusion that Django was poorly paced, disjointed, all over the place. I don’t buy this. Was Pulp Fiction not “all over the place”? Isn’t this one of its charms? I found the use of a relatively consistent single narrative refreshing for this movie, maybe a first for Tarantino, but that disinterest in continuity remained in his preference for jumping around from time to time and place to place even in the Antebellum South. It made for a particularly strong rhythm and tone in the KKK sequence.
In perhaps the greatest montage sequence Tarantino has even produced, the “Freedom” sequence depicting Django and Broomhilda’s attempted escape, there’s no question about the skill of the editing. It’s placed at the exact right time in the film’s duration, and the different lighting effect mixed with the music and the pace of it captures the urgency and emotional extremity of Django’s situation that immediately hooks us into his story and motivation. It turns the film from a straightforward Western revenge tale into a romance. I’m not sure if anything since the “Married Life” sequence from Up has provided such an amazing hook so tightly.
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