Inglourious Basterds - Plot

Plot

In 1941, SD Colonel Hans Landa (Christoph Waltz), nicknamed the "Jew Hunter", interrogates French dairy farmer Perrier LaPadite (Denis Menochet). To save his family, LaPadite confesses to hiding the Jewish Dreyfus family underneath his floor. Landa orders SS soldiers to shoot through the floorboards and kill the family, but allows teenage Shosanna (Mélanie Laurent) to escape.

In spring 1944, 1st Special Service Force Lieutenant Aldo Raine (Brad Pitt) recruits eight Jewish-American soldiers for a mission behind enemy lines, telling them they each owe 100 Nazi scalps and will take no prisoners. The "Basterds" become so feared, Adolf Hitler (Martin Wuttke) personally interviews a soldier, Butz (Sönke Möhring). Butz relates how his squad was ambushed and his sergeant (Richard Sammel) beaten to death with a baseball bat by Staff Sergeant Donny Donowitz (Eli Roth), the "Bear Jew", when the sergeant refused to divulge information. Butz survived by providing the information, but Raine carved a swastika into his forehead with a knife.

In June 1944, Shosanna runs a cinema in Paris as "Emmanuelle Mimieux". She meets Fredrick Zoller (Daniel Brühl), a German sniper whose exploits are to be celebrated in a Nazi propaganda film, Stolz der Nation (Nation's Pride), starring as himself. Attracted to Shosanna, Zoller convinces Joseph Goebbels (Sylvester Groth) to hold the premiere at her cinema. Shosanna seizes the opportunity, secretly resolving to burn down her cinema with her black projectionist and lover, Marcel (Jacky Ido) and killing the top Nazi leaders at the premiere. Meanwhile, film critic of German cinema, Lieutenant Archie Hicox (Michael Fassbender) is recruited for "Operation Kino" by British General Ed Fenech (Mike Myers) and Prime Minister Winston Churchill (Rod Taylor). Hicox will rendezvous with their agent, German film star Bridget von Hammersmark (Diane Kruger) and the Basterds, and infiltrate and plant explosives at the premiere.

Hicox and Hugo Stiglitz (Til Schweiger), a convicted German sergeant freed by and joining the Basterds after killing several of his superiors, meet von Hammersmark at a tavern where Staff Sergeant Wilhelm (Alexander Fehling) celebrates the birth of his baby son. Sturmbannführer (SS rank equivalent to major) Dieter Hellstrom (August Diehl) notices Hicox's odd accent. Hicox gives himself away, signalling three drinks by not holding up his fingers correctly as a German would do. In the ensuing firefight, everyone except Wilhelm and von Hammersmark is killed. While Raine negotiates with Wilhelm, the actress shoots the sergeant. Though his German-speaking men and Hicox are dead, Raine, upon learning from von Hammersmark that Hitler himself will be attending the premiere, decides to go ahead anyway. He, Donny, and Omar (Omar Doom) pose as von Hammersmark's Italian escort and cameramen. Later, Landa investigates and finds von Hammersmark's shoe and her autographed napkin at the tavern.

At the premiere, Landa, who can speak Italian, is not fooled and sees von Hammersmark privately. Making her wear the shoe, which fits, he strangles her, then orders Raine and Utivich's (B. J. Novak) capture. Landa has Raine contact his commanding officer (Harvey Keitel) and reveals he has not hindered the explosives plan, but since it will end the war he wishes for immunity, American citizenship and financial security. During the screening, Zoller slips away to the projection room to see Shosanna, who rejects his advances but then has him lock the door. With his back turned, she fatally shoots him, but he manages to turn and fatally shoot her as well. Meanwhile Omar and Donowitz manage to dispatch the soldiers guarding Hitler.

A spliced-in clip of Shosanna cackling in the cinema informs the audience that they are about to be killed by a Jew. Marcel, having locked the cinema exits, ignites a pile of extremely flammable nitrate film behind the screen. Omar and Donowitz burst into the screening as it burns and riddle Hitler and Goebbels, as well as the fleeing crowd, with machine gun fire until the bombs go off and destroy the cinema. Landa and his radio operator drive Raine and Utivich across the American lines, whereupon they surrender. To Landa's horror, Raine shoots the radio operator. Raine agrees for the deal, but carves a swastika into Landa's forehead to remind everyone that he is a Nazi, for the rest of his life.