Tarantino villains are known to be particularly nasty and quite violent at times, but the best among them are those that are a hidden surprise that is right in front of your face, like Hans Landa. Out of all the villains that Tarantino has used he is perhaps the very best simply because he is not the mad dog killer type, though he harbors that kind of spirit as you can see from his actions in the movie Inglorious Basterds. Landa is more or less the calm, rational villain that knows simply rolling over his enemies isn’t going to produce much more than a mess and several escapees that could come back and possibly cause him another round of problems. Yet for some reason in the beginning of the film he allows one individual to escape when he could have gunned her down just as simply as his soldiers did her family. Why would this happen? Because word of what befell the family, if spread by the survivor, could flush out even more prey for him to hunt down. After all, a Jew Hunter that simply annihilates his prey would soon be out of a job. Macabre and as horrible as that sounds it seems quite true since his passive-aggressive manner and calculating mind conspired to create a character that was both ruthless and cunning all at once.
Yet despite this there was a strange, childlike glee that came over him at times, and an affable nature that presented itself at others when he saw fit to converse with those he suspected of being in league with those he was hunting. Somehow Landa could be the most pleasant man and charm just about anyone, but in a second he could turn deadly and as dangerous as a viper poised to strike. That makes him one of the absolute best villains in the history of cinema to be honest.
Here are a few clips from Inglorious Basterds that might help you realize just how bad this guy can be.
The opening scene in which he enters the home of the man hiding Shoshanna and the others is one that’s laced with tension. The man recognizes who they are, he knows who Landa is and what he does. The Jew Hunter is notorious for his ability to sniff out his prey, so to speak, and knows very well that this man is hiding Jewish refugees but yet he sits and talks with him in a civil, almost friendly tone. You can just feel the danger mount to precipitous levels as Landa continues to talk in his calm, reasonable voice, even going so far as to smile as he speaks and make pleasant conversation. But at the end of this scene it becomes a Tarantino-esque slaughter as you would expect, with Shoshanna running away covered in blood and not even bothering to look where she’s going as the terror that Landa managed to unleash drives her onward.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8eJPgA9wECU
Ah yes the infamous strudel scene. The tenseness of the scene of course comes first from the fact that Shoshanna recognizes him, but the manner in which he is attacking the strudel as he eats it seems to send a message that there is a great deal of pent-up aggression in Landa that he’s just waiting to let out. Christoph Waltz even admitted that the strudel scene was considered important as it highlighted the fact that Landa was not only dangerous, but that he knew how to send a message without using his words. There is no doubt that he recognizes Shoshanna, but like a patient predator he continues to wait, biding his time until he can find the proper moment to strike. It’s been seen throughout history, both in real life and in cinema, that the most patient killers are often the most dangerous. They plot, they scheme, and often they are very, VERY good at it. Hans Landa is one of the best because he knows how to play the game and knows when to pick his moments. But he also knows how to leave subtle warnings that he’s closing in, thereby enhancing the terror he causes.
There is still that affable nature to him however, that one quality that never seems to go away. When he’s making a deal with Aldo to give up the high command it seems pretty clear that as dedicated as he is to his work, he’s more than willing to torch the entirety of the Reich without much, if any, remorse. This is another reason why he’s the perfect villain, in Tarantino’s movie or any other, he has no compunctions about doing what it takes to survive, at any cost. Hans Landa is a survivor that uses the villainous role he’s given to his best advantage, and that’s what makes him truly dangerous.
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