Inglorious Bastards - Starring Fred Williamson

B-Movie Inspiration for Tarantino's World War II Epic

Nov 7, 2009

'Macaroni' Combat movie with a motley crew of soldiers undertaking a mission to blow up an armoured train carrying V8 rockets. Bo Svenson and Fred Williamson star.

Though Quentin Tarantino used Enzo G. Castelleri’s B-movie as a starting point for his own Inglourious Basterds he takes very little from the original. Apart from the World War II setting the two films have only a few things in common. There is a bunch of guys on a Dirty Dozen (Robert Aldrich 1967) style mission and a sequence where Allied troops in Nazi uniforms get killed and that’s pretty much it.

The Inglorious Bastards

Bo Svenson plays Lt Robert Yeager, a pilot facing court martial for repeatedly flying his fighter plane to London so he can visit his girlfriend. Yeager is placed amongst another group of prisoners who are being shipped to HQ for execution. These include Canfield (Fred ‘The Hammer’ Williamson) and drawling nutcase Tony (Peter Hooten). Their convoy is attacked and they overpower the military police.

Their intention is to head for Switzerland and sit out the rest of the war. They are aided by a German deserter who agrees to take them to the border. During their journey they kill a German platoon, only to find out they were really highly trained American soldiers on a mission to destroy an armoured train carrying V8 rockets. The group then decide to finish the job for them.

Although smaller in scale than Tarantino’s epic which aims to wipe out the leaders of the Third Reich, Castelleri’s movie is worth a look. Inglorious Bastards is a breezily efficient Dirty Dozen knock off with charismatic performances from Bo Svenson (Walking Tall) and in particular Fred Williamson (Black Caesar). Its fairly straightforward with no depth or character development, save for a moment involving their new found German ally.

One of the most entertaining aspects of Inglorious Bastards is watching the stuntmen dressed as German troops throwing themselves about any time an explosion lands near them. They spin through the air, pirouette, or dive about like Italian footballers trying to win a penalty. It is if they were having a competition to see who could get the most ridiculous death scene into the movie.

There is also an amusing sequence when the Bastards discover a group of German women skinny-dipping and end up being chased by machine-gun welding Nazi nudists after the girls catch sight of Fred Willamson and realise these guys are Americans. The limitations of the production are always apparent, and the indestructible train looks about as dangerous as Thomas the Tank Engine but Inglorious Bastards is never less than entertaining.

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