BASTERDS Is 1 Minute Longer, Prequel In Writing Process, And Empire Mag Cover

Let’s go through some of the latest INGLOURIOUS BASTERDS info real quick so we can know much about this upcoming masterpiece. Special thanks to Tarantino Archives for the heads up. Variety had an interview with Quentin Tarantino who talks about how the movie’s actually going to be 1 minute longer than the version shown at Cannes Film Festival. He denied rumors about Weinstein asking him to cut 40 minutes out to make the Nazi-killing movie shorter for commercial advantages. Read the excerpt after the jump…

“I’ve heard these rumors that the studios told me to cut out 40 minutes. These are complete lies. The movie is actually a minute longer, in running time, than it was in Cannes. It was 2:28, without end credits, and now it’s 2:29, or 2:32 with end credits
To add the one scene, I reduced a couple scenes by a line here, a line there. I’d talk to the Weinsteins, and Universal, and they’d say, “This sequence is running a little long.” I’d say, I don’t think I can take more than maybe one line out of there, and they’d say, that’s fine. Then you have to find that one line. It’s cosmetic surgery. Harvey wanted me to add more music, he asked me to go through my music collection again and just find a couple more pieces. So, I found four cues, and one of them is the main theme from the Jack Cardiff movie “Dark of the Sun,” which I’d always wanted to use.”

He even talked about the prequel which is already in the writing process..

I’ve written the first half already. I’d have to finish it, get the Basterds back together, and insert a whole other group of characters, these black troops that come across the Basterds.
All through the movie, Brad Pitt and Eli Roth just kept saying, “Prequel. Prequel.” Brad would say, “Let’s talk him into doing a prequel.” The guys love the idea. I’ve got the storyline.

One of the BASTERDS, filmmaker/actor Eli Roth talked to Movieweb on the same matters at hand..

After Cannes, Quentin always said that he wanted to do some cutting, and pruning, and that he was going to be changing things. There was a lot of stuff left out before. He felt that he had over cut. There were certain scenes that were taken out for Cannes that will come back into the final version. Because it plays better like that. I think the final version of the film is five or six minutes longer than the version shown in Cannes. From what Quentin has told me, he has fleshed it out a little bit more. Cannes running length was at two hours and twenty-five minutes. I think this is a little over two hours and thirty minutes. Something close to that.
Quentin has an entire universe planned out for Inglourious Basterds. With Aldo and Donny in Italy with a troop of black soliders. He has a whole prequel planned, and most of it is written. If the movie does well, he will make the prequel. I want to see a prequel. Both Brad and I want to be in it. Brad and I were in Cannes screaming, “Prequel, prequel, prequel!” He even has two sequels planned. He’s not necessarily going to make these movies. But he has at least four our five stories centering on these characters that span through the fifties and sixties. He knows exactly where these characters are going. He has this whole universe mapped out in his head.

And last but certainly not least, the latest issue of Empire Magazine has Brad Pitt as Lt. Aldo Raine on the cover

INGLOURIOUS BASTERDS opens August 21st, 2009