It does my heart good to see more and more outlets giving the proper consideration to below-the-line talent when it comes to film publicity.  As you know, we’ve made it a rather concentrated effort to spotlight these individuals in Gerard’s weekly Tech Support columns and have been at it for the last three years.

A couple of pieces caught my eye today featuring talent associated with Quentin Tarantino’s “Inglourious Basterds,” a film that, despite my feelings of the narrative, had a rather refreshing visceral sheen to it.  That’s a tribute, no doubt, to folks like Bob Richardson, David Wasco, Anna B. Sheppard, etc.

First up is a piece at BoxWish.com featuring costume designer Anna B. Sheppard (whose work in the film is on display at LA area theaters this week).  An esteemed costumer twice Oscar-nominated for Holocaust cinema (Steven Spielberg’s “Schindler’s List” and Roman Polanski’s “The Pianist”), she certainly brought a lot to the table.

Here’s a taste:

Clearly her CV made her an ideal fit for whipping up the era’s authentic period costumes, but it was a challenge that Sheppard was slow to accept until assured that Inglourious Basterds wasn’t a traditional by-the-book retelling of World War II’s horrors, but a boisterous, imaginative and spiky vision of it…

“I felt that I was given a lot of freedom and that gave me courage to try new things, and to try a new approach,” she says. “I really enjoyed doing a movie from this period like never before. Maybe doing the other ones made me confident about this period, but also it gave me great joy to see how appreciated my costumes were.”

Meanwhile, over at Flavorwire, the production design couple David and Sandy Wasco get their day in the sun:

Preparations for Inglourious Basterds were much the same as Pulp Fiction: lots of film references. Much like Jack Rabbit Slim’s, the cinema in Inglourious Basterds was a centerpiece set with a mixed pedigree. QT mentioned LA’s New Beverly Cinema for the projection room and its Vista Theatre for the auditorium dimension and number of seats as models…

[It] was the most challenging set in Germany. We started to approach it as a 50/50 blend of built sets mixed with dressed or altered practical locations; but after scouting, the money involved with lengthy rentals and town street closures, it became prohibitive; so it was decided to build the facade on the Babelsberg Backlot and the interiors on the Marlene Dietrich Stage.

It’s really ironic that the Wascos mention the New Beverly, because earlier this morning I received another email from the same Academy member who questioned the Oscar discussion about “District 9” last week and found the design of the film rather lacking, specifically the cinema set:

The film had a very good turnout with a very good reaction overall.  The thing that makes me think that it was not a GREAT reaction is that there was little visible response during the film.  I’ve seen films there where there is applause during a great dance number or even an impressive action sequence or amazing special effect. I thought that they would have applauded when Hitler and the gang were killed, etc.   Also, I thought that the film had a fairly cheap look to it for some reason.  I couldn’t believe that the Nazi elite would premiere their film at a theater that looked more like the New Beverly Cinema (no insult meant there) than a real Nazi palace.  Still a very good film, but felt like it could use more action and less talk.  Some really great suspense sequences, though.

I can definitely understand where the AMPAS member is coming from.  There were elements of the overall design that seemed a bit shoddy, but I thought on the whole, it was a solid design effort.

Related Posts

• REVIEW: “Inglourious Basterds” (**1/2)
• Grammys for Giacchino
• Klavan strikes again: ‘Basterds’ and trivializing the Holocaust
• INTERVIEW: Quentin Tarantino
• INTERVIEW: Michael Fassbender
• Why I’m backing the Basterds