For at least a few weeks before it’s release (and for the subsequent month afterwards), Kathryn Bigelow’s latest film Zero Dark Thirty has been achieving a gargantuan amount of press. There’s been plenty of good word, with the film receiving nearly unanimous praise from critics for it’s deft  and relevant subject matter and appearing on many top ten lists. There have been more troubling headlines, however, with some sources calling the film a glorification of torture, an improper exposure to classified material, as well as a shallow reenactment on the war of terror that ultimately gives Osama bin Laden the last laugh (This Rolling Stone article is particularly damning). It’s certainly one of the most challenging films of the year in that regard, and I myself have found myself agreeing with both camps at times. Still, I feel that this a film that must be seen, judged and contemplated by each viewer on his/her own philosophies.

Zero Dark Thirty is very much a follow up film to The Hurt Locker, but it is in some ways an even more important film. The Hurt Locker is an intense study of American soldiers fighting a brutal conflict in Iraq,  while Zero Dark Thirty is a political thriller that acts as a reminder of the paranoia that plagued are nation based on the livelihood of one particular terrorist. As many of you are aware, Zero Dark Thirty is a dramatized account of the decade-long hunt for Osama Bin Laden. The film’s action orbits around central protagonist Maya (Jessica Chastain) a CIA operative with an obsessive need to find Osama Bin Laden. Through a chronological narrative that spans the September 11 attacks right up to the killing of Osama Bin Laden on May 2nd, 2011, Maya acts as our declassified government document that examines what happened to track down the Al Quaida leader. Bribery, speculation, interrogation and the much discussed graphic scenes of torture are the methods that follows in the film’s 157 minute running time.

The allegations that Zero Dark Thirty is exposing unwanted American secrets is not entirely unfounded, but it’s necessary for this type of film to be as truthful as the momentum would allow. Interestingly, the film could have been so much less than what it was, and it can indeed be attributed to the sudden slaying of Osama Bin Laden two years ago. Director Kathryn Bigelow and writer/journalist Mark Boal were planning to make a film about the 2001 siege of the Tora Bora where Osama was believed to have escaped without a trace, but then when he was actually killed in a raid the duo decided to change the film’s concept entirely. Using the research they had accumulated over the last year, the writing/directing pair composed a new film that would center around the whole zeitgeist for America’s hunt for Osama Bin Laden.

I have to admit, while watching the film I was a bit frustrated at times. The film does indeed begin with a torture scene, which immediately grabbed me, but afterwards I couldn’t help but ask if the filmmakers were suggesting that the actions of the Americans was fully justified. I was fully immersed in the film’s story and performances, and in all honesty it hardly felt like the move was over two-and-a-half hours. Still, my frustrations remained for most of the running time too (perhaps in no small part as we all knew what the ending would be), and I found myself wondering if the film could have posed more questions about did the ends justify the means.

Then…the final shot happened. After a visceral and dynamic climax where I couldn’t stand to blink for a moment, Bigelow and Boal gave us the final shot that the film needed. Not to spoil much, but it was a tender and emotional moment with the film’s lead of Maya. Up to this point we had indeed been seeing this war on terror through her determined mind. Now that it was over, however, both Maya and us viewers were left to ponder what it all meant. Perhaps I’m trying to over-analyze a film that is in many ways just an action film, but I personally don’t think that the filmmakers could have capped off such a compelling work of cinema with a more long-lasting image.

At the end of the day, Zero Dark Thirty is a fabulous political thriller, and the most satisfying American film of the year overall. Whether the filmmakers intended the film to attract this much public outcry is hard to say, but I’m certain they aren’t appreciative that their hard work is being judged as amoral. It’s also an absolute shame that Kathryn Bigelow  was denied a best director nomination this year (along with other shoe-ins like Paul Thomas Anderson, Ben Affleck, and Wes Anderson), but it seems the film has earned itself another merit. Zero Dark Thirty is easily the most controversial film, amidst the most controversial Oscar season in years.

While the 90s indie boom saw many filmmakers in full boom (Paul Thomas Anderson, The Coen Brothers, Richard Linklater) there’s little argument that Tarantino was most likely the most influential one of his era, as well as the most successful one overall. In all honesty, it wouldn’t be a stretch to call Tarantino the most important American auteur since Martin Scorsese, as his sense of dialogue, extreme violence, non-linear story telling, and retrospective aesthetics practically manufactured the careers of the likes of Guy Ritchie and Martin McDonagh. Hell, had Tarantino decided to set his camera down after making Pulp Fiction and Reservoir Dogs, it would have been enough to give him iconic status. Of course, that didn’t happen though, and Tarantino has continued to make excellent genre cinema for these last two decades, which has seen his style taking both to extemes (Kill Bill) to the more subdued (Jackie Brown).

The director’s latest, Django Unchained, is very much a cumulnation of the director’s entire body of work up to this point. Certainly a follow-up piece to his WWII film Inglorious Basterds, this new film is in essence a period piece (this time the American south before the Civil War), but one that isn’t afraid to use anachronisms for the sake of good storytelling. D’Jango Unchained is a sparkling homage to spaghetti westerns and blaxploitation cinema, as well as a splatterfest that recalls Tarantino’s love of the cheap thrills of grindhouse cinema. The film centers on the title character, a freed slave (Jamie Foxx) who teams up with a German named King Schultz (Christoph Waltz)  to begin a lucrative partnership in bounty hunting. Of course there is an end goal in mind for our hero Django, as he also plans to rescue his wife Broomhilda (Kerry Washington) from evil plantation owner Calvin Candie, and his similarly twisted house slave Stephen (Samuel L. Jackson).

It’s certainly a story that catches Tarantino in his element, and I honestly think he’s possibly the only filmmaker who could have given this film the much needed tongue-in-cheek quality that it has. It’s a very modern film despite it’s setting and adherence to past eras of cinema. This is most  immediately apparent in a scene where the characters are riding horse-and-buggy across a plantation field as a Rick Ross song plays in the background. It’s anachronistic, attention grabbing, and possibly brilliant film making.

The film certainly has a higher body count than Sergio Leone could of ever dreamed of, yet for the most part us viewers can’t help but cheer at seeing Django lay waste to these white slaving bastards. Tarantino’s films have always been about kicking up things a few notches from reality, and the slave-driven America that Tarantino showcases here is nothing short of vicious. While there was never any proof towards the existence of mandingo fighting (forcing slaves to fight to the death for entertainment), he implies that the world of Django Unchained accepts it publicly. Many are likely to see this film as a gratuitous sensationalizing of slavery, but just as Tarantino climaxed Inglorious Basterds with Hitler getting his head caved in to machine gun fire, the director is merely exposing the evils of history in his playful and pulpish style.

That said, all of this would be for nothing if the acting couldn’t match Tarantino’s aloofness, but fortunately for us, wise casting has saved the day once again. Jamie Foxx certainly gives Django the right amount of coolness and badassery, but he isn’t quite the highlight of this film, as the supporting cast is just so electric! Christoph Waltz continues to show what a brilliant actor he is, as his affable slave-freer is a complete 180 from the flamboyantly insidious Nazi he played in Inglorious Basterds. Speaking of villains, both Leonardo DiCaprio and Samuel L. Jackson are fantastic in their bad guy roles, and there’s one particular scene involving DiCaprio’s character and a hammer that truly made me cringe.

There are two facets of the film, however, that fall behind Tarantino’s usual standards. For one, this is far from the best script that Tarantino has written as it’s surprisingly linear. It doesn’t have the complex sub-plot conjunction of Inglorious Basterds, or the brilliant time-shifting narratives that have carried his best work, despite a few flashback sequences that are shot in a deliciously grainy exploitation-esque style. Most of the violence is just point and shoot also, as opposed to the more creative pummeling that could be found in his earlier work. Also, Django Unchained is a bit too long, which might be the result of Tarantino’s new editor. All of Tarantino’s previous films were edited by Sally Menke, who sadly passed away in 2009. His new editor Fred Raskin certainly knows how to cut an action sequence, but dialogue heavy scenes aren’t necessarily his forte. It pains me to say it, but there are a few talky scenes in the movie that go on a bit too long.

Still, D’Jango Unchained is indeed worthy of the Tarantino name, and it’s not really any less messy than some of the spaghetti westerns and exploitation films it’s blatantly mimicking. Fans of the director won’t be disappointed and are even likely to see the film as his best work to date just based on aesthetics alone. Once again, don’t expect Tarantino to win any Oscars this year, but maybe that’s a good thing.