# Django Unchained movie thread! (open spoilers) **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [December 26, 2012, 3:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/django-unchained-movie-thread-open-spoilers/645150 "2012-12-26T03:28:22Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 14
**Author:** ![Equipoise](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/equipoise/32/151_2.png) [@Equipoise](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Equipoise)\ **Post date:** [January 20, 2013, 6:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/django-unchained-movie-thread-open-spoilers/645150/261 "2013-01-20T06:37:32Z")
Isn’t this getting a little toooo nitpicky, espcially when we know it’s a direct homage? Plus, Django knowing how to spell it made for one of the best jokes in the film. Let it go folks, let it go. ---
**Author:** ![Miller](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/miller/32/481_2.png) [@Miller](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Miller)\ **Post date:** [January 20, 2013, 6:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/django-unchained-movie-thread-open-spoilers/645150/262 "2013-01-20T06:42:56Z")
> [@Equipoise](#): > > Isn’t this getting a little toooo nitpicky, espcially when we know it’s a direct homage? Plus, Django knowing how to spell it made for one of the best jokes in the film. Let it go folks, let it go. You know, if you don’t like a conversation, you are more than welcome not to participate in it. ---
**Author:** ![Shakester](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/shakester/32/437_2.png) [@Shakester](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shakester)\ **Post date:** [January 20, 2013, 6:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/django-unchained-movie-thread-open-spoilers/645150/263 "2013-01-20T06:44:51Z")
> [@Miller](#): > > Right, except he didn’t know how to read until Schultz taught him - and how would Schultz know how to spell it? Why _wouldn’t_ Schultz know how to spell it? Maybe he knew some gypsies back in Germany. Maybe he picked up some linguistics in his travels and recognised [the /dʒ/ sound](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Voiced_palato-alveolar_affricate). I’ve worked with children who have learning disorders, and even they almost always know how to spell their own names, even if they can’t spell anything else at all. I see no reason to doubt that a slave in the US could have picked up the spelling of his own name. Some slaves were literate, and those that were often shared their knowledge with those who weren’t. It’s really not a big leap to believe that Django could have known the spelling of his own name. Slavery in the US was horrific, but it (mostly) wasn’t death camp genocide stuff. Slaves could and did learn how to read. Literacy would have been expected in house slaves and those that did skilled work. Teaching a slave to read increased the slave’s value - they weren’t kept illiterate deliberately. Owners might not have spent much time and effort on it, but it usually wasn’t actively discouraged. And, as I’ve said already, in a movie filled with anachronisms, why is this one so difficult to swallow and all the others not? Why is nobody complaining that the slaves use late 20th century slang and not mid-19th century? That’s a lot more unlikely than Django knowing how to spell his own name. ---
**Author:** ![Nzinga\_Seated](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/b5ac83/32.png) [@Nzinga\_Seated](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nzinga_Seated)\ **Post date:** [January 20, 2013, 8:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/django-unchained-movie-thread-open-spoilers/645150/264 "2013-01-20T08:03:32Z")
I’m with Equipoise, it is getting a bit nitpicky. I can think of a zillion reasons why he would know how to spell ‘Django’. He was named after a favorite uncle of his first master, and the child in the home taught him to spell it, being extra careful to impress upon him the silent D. I mean, I really am baffled how people can’t see that kind of thing just being a given in a movie like this. ---
**Author:** ![Miller](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/miller/32/481_2.png) [@Miller](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Miller)\ **Post date:** [January 20, 2013, 8:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/django-unchained-movie-thread-open-spoilers/645150/265 "2013-01-20T08:29:56Z")
> [@Shakester](#): > > Why _wouldn’t_ Schultz know how to spell it? Maybe he knew some gypsies back in Germany. Maybe he picked up some linguistics in his travels and recognised [the /dʒ/ sound](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Voiced_palato-alveolar_affricate). I suppose its possible, but it strikes me as kind of an absurd coincidence. Django is an \*extremely \*unusual name. What are the odds of what must be the only guy in North America named Django running into the only guy in North America who knows how to spell Django? > [@](#): > > Slavery in the US was horrific, but it (mostly) wasn’t death camp genocide stuff. Slaves could and did learn how to read. Literacy would have been expected in house slaves and those that did skilled work. Teaching a slave to read increased the slave’s value - they weren’t kept illiterate deliberately. Owners might not have spent much time and effort on it, but it usually wasn’t actively discouraged. Actually, by the mid-nineteenth century, it was illegal to teach a slave literacy throughout the slave states. > [@](#): > > And, as I’ve said already, in a movie filled with anachronisms, why is this one so difficult to swallow and all the others not? Why is nobody complaining that the slaves use late 20th century slang and not mid-19th century? That’s a lot more unlikely than Django knowing how to spell his own name. Anachronisms don’t usually bother me, particularly ones based around language usage or accents. This isn’t an anachronism, though, it’s an internal plot error, which tend to bug me a bit more. Not that I was bothered by this one - I thought it was kind of amusing. I didn’t really expect to see a debate over it. ---
**Author:** ![Nzinga\_Seated](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/b5ac83/32.png) [@Nzinga\_Seated](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nzinga_Seated)\ **Post date:** [January 20, 2013, 8:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/django-unchained-movie-thread-open-spoilers/645150/266 "2013-01-20T08:41:40Z")
> [@Miller](#): > > Actually, by the mid-nineteenth century, it was illegal to teach a slave literacy throughout the slave states. Do you actually mean you think it didn’t happen? Because it was illegal??? ---
**Author:** ![Miller](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/miller/32/481_2.png) [@Miller](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Miller)\ **Post date:** [January 20, 2013, 8:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/django-unchained-movie-thread-open-spoilers/645150/267 "2013-01-20T08:50:24Z")
> [@Nzinga\_Seated](#): > > Do you actually mean you think it didn’t happen? Because it was illegal??? 😕 No, that’s not remotely close to what I was saying. ---
**Author:** ![Nzinga\_Seated](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/b5ac83/32.png) [@Nzinga\_Seated](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nzinga_Seated)\ **Post date:** [January 20, 2013, 9:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/django-unchained-movie-thread-open-spoilers/645150/268 "2013-01-20T09:07:53Z")
> [@Miller](#): > > 😕 No, that’s not remotely close to what I was saying. Oh. ---
**Author:** ![Shakester](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/shakester/32/437_2.png) [@Shakester](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shakester)\ **Post date:** [January 20, 2013, 9:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/django-unchained-movie-thread-open-spoilers/645150/269 "2013-01-20T09:08:31Z")
> [@Miller](#): > > I suppose its possible, but it strikes me as kind of an absurd coincidence. Django is an \*extremely \*unusual name. What are the odds of what must be the only guy in North America named Django running into the only guy in North America who knows how to spell Django? What are the odds of anything in a Tarantino movie? We’re not talking about a documentary, or about a movie that even pretends to be realistic, we’re talking about _a Tarantino movie_. Do you remember the bit in Quentin’s last movie where Americans assassinated Hitler in a French Cinema? > [@Miller](#): > > Actually, by the mid-nineteenth century, it was illegal to teach a slave literacy throughout the slave states. …and yet, house slaves and artisan slaves certainly _were_ literate, and we have letters written by them and even [books written by ex-slaves](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Narrative_of_the_Life_of_Frederick_Douglass,_an_American_Slave). So clearly there _were_ literate slaves. > [@Miller](#): > > This isn’t an anachronism, though, it’s an internal plot error, which tend to bug me a bit more. No, it’s entirely plausible, within the context of a Tarantino movie, and in real life, that an ex-slave might know how to spell his own name. And that’s it for me, I rest my case and any further arguing about this can be addressed to someone else. ---
**Author:** ![Miller](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/miller/32/481_2.png) [@Miller](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Miller)\ **Post date:** [January 20, 2013, 9:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/django-unchained-movie-thread-open-spoilers/645150/270 "2013-01-20T09:54:43Z")
> [@Shakester](#): > > What are the odds of anything in a Tarantino movie? We’re not talking about a documentary, or about a movie that even pretends to be realistic, we’re talking about _a Tarantino movie_. Do you remember the bit in Quentin’s last movie where Americans assassinated Hitler in a French Cinema? Right. It’s not a realistic movie. I pointed out another example of how it was unrealistic. I’m not sure why that has you so torqued up. > [@](#): > > …and yet, house slaves and artisan slaves certainly _were_ literate, and we have letters written by them and even [books written by ex-slaves](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Narrative_of_the_Life_of_Frederick_Douglass,_an_American_Slave). So clearly there _were_ literate slaves. Sure, and I never said otherwise. I was correcting you when you said that slaves learning how to read wasn’t considered a big deal. It was, in fact, considered a big deal, and a good deal of effort went in to making sure that slaves couldn’t read. > [@](#): > > No, it’s entirely plausible, within the context of a Tarantino movie, and in real life, that an ex-slave might know how to spell his own name. I didn’t say it was implausible that any slave would be unlikely to know how to spell his name, I said it was unlikely that this slave, in the circusomstances shown in the movie, would know how to accurately spell his name. ---
**Author:** ![monstro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/ba9def/32.png) [@monstro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/monstro)\ **Post date:** [January 20, 2013, 2:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/django-unchained-movie-thread-open-spoilers/645150/271 "2013-01-20T14:32:42Z")
You know what makes films great? They can be analyzed. Everything about them. Without people waving their hands at every turn. Analyzing the titular name is not “nitpickery”. It’s analyzing the very essence of the film. Although “Django” as a slave name was possible, it is obscure enough that we could have benefited from a backstory. ---
**Author:** ![The\_Other\_Waldo\_Pepper](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/the_other_waldo_pepper/32/12370_2.png) [@The\_Other\_Waldo\_Pepper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Other_Waldo_Pepper)\ **Post date:** [January 20, 2013, 3:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/django-unchained-movie-thread-open-spoilers/645150/272 "2013-01-20T15:10:42Z")
> [@Miller](#): > > Right, except he didn’t know how to read until Schultz taught him - and how would Schultz know how to spell it? Wasn’t the whole point that Schultz located Django in hopes of tracking down guys Django could identify on sight? We see how Schultz locates Hildy, by reading the plantation records of who bought her and when; he presumably found Django the same way. (At that, didn’t Django get signed over to Schultz’s ownership?) ---
**Author:** ![BrokenBriton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/4bbf92/32.png) [@BrokenBriton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrokenBriton)\ **Post date:** [January 20, 2013, 4:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/django-unchained-movie-thread-open-spoilers/645150/273 "2013-01-20T16:31:34Z")
> [@monstro](#): > > You know what makes films great? They can be analyzed. Everything about them. Without people waving their hands at every turn. Analyzing the titular name is not “nitpickery”. It’s analyzing the very essence of the film. > > Although “Django” as a slave name was possible, it is obscure enough that we could have benefited from a backstory. The back story is - the entire back story is - ‘Django’ is a name much used in spaghetti westerns. On 31 occasions according to Wikipedia. That’s it. That is the whole story. > **[Django (character)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Django_%28character%29)** > > Django is a fictional character who appears in a number of Spaghetti Western films. Originally played by Franco Nero in the 1966 Italian film of the same name by Sergio Corbucci, he has appeared in 31 films since then. Especially outside of the genre's home country Italy, mainly Germany, countless releases have been retitled in the wake of the original film's enormous success. > Django is a 1966 Spaghetti Western directed by Sergio Corbucci starring Franco Nero as Django; a dismissed Union sold... ---
**Author:** ![Miller](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/miller/32/481_2.png) [@Miller](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Miller)\ **Post date:** [January 20, 2013, 5:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/django-unchained-movie-thread-open-spoilers/645150/274 "2013-01-20T17:56:38Z")
> [@The\_Other\_Waldo\_Pepper](#): > > Wasn’t the whole point that Schultz located Django in hopes of tracking down guys Django could identify on sight? We see how Schultz locates Hildy, by reading the plantation records of who bought her and when; he presumably found Django the same way. (At that, didn’t Django get signed over to Schultz’s ownership?) That is an excellent point. ---
**Author:** ![monstro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/ba9def/32.png) [@monstro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/monstro)\ **Post date:** [January 20, 2013, 6:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/django-unchained-movie-thread-open-spoilers/645150/275 "2013-01-20T18:08:11Z")
> [@BrokenBriton](#): > > The back story is - the entire back story is - ‘Django’ is a name much used in spaghetti westerns. On 31 occasions according to Wikipedia. > > That’s it. That is the whole story. > > [Django (character) - Wikipedia](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Django_%28character%29) This doesn’t explain how a slave got the name. So no, that’s not the kind of back story I’m talking. I’ll going to chalk this one up to me not being a fan of QT movies and being perfectly fine with this. ---
**Author:** ![monstro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/ba9def/32.png) [@monstro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/monstro)\ **Post date:** [January 20, 2013, 6:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/django-unchained-movie-thread-open-spoilers/645150/276 "2013-01-20T18:24:38Z")
I mean, “Hilde” is a fairly unusual name for a slave, but not nearly as obscure as “Django”. Yet, QT saw fit to include a back story to explain it. ---
**Author:** ![BrokenBriton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/4bbf92/32.png) [@BrokenBriton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrokenBriton)\ **Post date:** [January 20, 2013, 6:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/django-unchained-movie-thread-open-spoilers/645150/277 "2013-01-20T18:31:25Z")
> [@monstro](#): > > I’ll going to chalk this one up to me not being a fan of QT movies and being perfectly fine with this. Prob a good idea. ---
**Author:** ![DMark](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e68b1a/32.png) [@DMark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DMark)\ **Post date:** [January 20, 2013, 7:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/django-unchained-movie-thread-open-spoilers/645150/278 "2013-01-20T19:18:59Z")
We finally got around to seeing Django Unchained yesterday - surprisingly large crowd for an afternoon screening. We loved it - thought it was the perfect combination of absurdity, humor and great visuals - probably our favorite QT film. As we both speak German, it was fun to see that incorporated into the film - quite unexpected to say the least. BTW - look back in any thread asking for baby names and you will see I almost always suggest Brunhilde! Looks like QT has been reading my threads! Spike Lee should have at least seen the film before throwing his hissy fit about it - yes, they bandy about the word Nigger - but those who like to use that word don’t usually hang around very long to chuckle about it. And coming from a small town in Illinois, let’s just say it isn’t the first time I have heard idiots say the word. I do sort of feel sorry for Leo DiCaprio and Sam Jackson - I mean, they were GREAT in their roles, but pretty hard to be Oscar bait when your characters are that vile. Christoph Waltz, on the other hand, is the glue that holds this story together and comes across as a wily, fair man for that era. At any rate - great film and fully deserves the nominations and awards it has received and hopefully will continue to receive. ---
**Author:** ![BrokenBriton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/4bbf92/32.png) [@BrokenBriton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrokenBriton)\ **Post date:** [January 20, 2013, 8:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/django-unchained-movie-thread-open-spoilers/645150/279 "2013-01-20T20:03:08Z")
> [@Shakester](#): > > Slavery in the US was horrific, but it (mostly) wasn’t death camp genocide stuff. Slaves could and did learn how to read. Literacy would have been expected in house slaves and those that did skilled work. Teaching a slave to read increased the slave’s value - they weren’t kept illiterate deliberately. Owners might not have spent much time and effort on it, but it usually wasn’t actively discouraged. ^ This whole paragraph is utter bullshit. > [@](#): > > While the punishments for white teachers varied from one state to another (and were generally far more severe in the deep South) punishments for slaves who desired to attain an education were generally left to their masters. Most often, slaves would be whipped, and according to Genovese’s study of slave narratives “among the bitterest recollections of ex-slaves were those of whippings for trying to learn to read. Few things so outraged their sense of justice” (565). > **[Education during the slave period in the United States](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Education_during_the_Slave_Period#Education_and_subversion_in_the_antebellum_era)** > > During the era of chattel slavery in the United States, the proper education of enslaved African Americans (with exception made for religious instruction) was highly discouraged, and eventually made illegal in most of the Southern states. > After 1831, the prohibition against educating enslaved persons was extended in some states to free blacks as well. Regardless of the legality of educating people of color, people in this demographic ultimately received limited access to education in both the ... ---
**Author:** ![Miller](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/miller/32/481_2.png) [@Miller](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Miller)\ **Post date:** [January 20, 2013, 8:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/django-unchained-movie-thread-open-spoilers/645150/280 "2013-01-20T20:04:34Z")
> [@DMark](#): > > I do sort of feel sorry for Leo DiCaprio and Sam Jackson - I mean, they were GREAT in their roles, but pretty hard to be Oscar bait when your characters are that vile. Just the opposite: Oscar loves good villains. Just look at the Best Supporting wins for 2007 to 2009: Christopher Waltz won in 2009 for his Nazi character in _Inglorius Basterds_ (beating out Stanley Tucci’s serial killer from _Lovely Bones_), Heath Ledger in 2008 for the Joker (beating out Josh Brolin’s Dan White in _Milk_, and Javier Bardem in _No Country for Old Men_ won in 2007 (beating Casey Affleck, who played one of the titular characters in _The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford_). The three best ways to get an Oscar nomination is to play someone who’s A) retarded, B) terminally ill, or C) completely evil. Someday, someone will play a serial killer with Down’s Syndrome and tubercleosis, and they won’t even bother nominating anyone else in his category. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/django-unchained-movie-thread-open-spoilers/645150.md?page=13) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/django-unchained-movie-thread-open-spoilers/645150.md?page=15)