Ever since the Nazis used the swatstika as their flag, that is what the symbol has and will forever be associated with and you have to be naive to say that isn't so. The filmmakers were well aware of what it means to many people before they used it several times in the film. This film is morally irresonsible, but I wouldn't classify this as one of its big offenses. Of course, one could make the argument that films like Bring Me the Head of Alfredo Garcia and Kill Bill are, too, but I'd rank those as masterpieces, as the filmmakers in each case are actually competent, to say the least.

That's simply not true. As Raggingbull said, "It is like the writers were writing and all the while asking themselves, "What would every guy in America like to see right now?" And in every scene, it delivers." Alas, we live in a country where male audiences want multiple castrations, multiple beheadings, and multiple scenes of torture. And bad jokes. Oh how terrible the unnecessary jokes were.

John Hartigan: I took away his weapons. Both of them.

Marv: I love hitmen. No matter what you do to them, you don't feel bad.

Dwight: She didn't cut his head off. She turned him into a Pez dispenser.

John Hartigan: When it comes to consoling 19-year-old girls, I'm about as useful as a palsy patient performing brain surgery with a pipe wrench.

...I think you get the point...

And the ending was an insult to the audience. I'm sure nobody took it as so, but it clearly was. Hartigan tried so hard to clear his name from molestation charges only to fall in love with the girl he was accused of molesting?

SPOILERS And then he commits suicide to save her? SPOILERS

There were two hours of complete immaturity followed by about 30 seconds of unconvincing drama and the film all of a sudden has depth? No. Soap opera is more convincing than this pretentious nonsense. I can't think of another film that was so self-congratulatory throughout, yet had absolutely nothing else to offer.

It could all be forgiven if it was entertaining but it simply was not; in fact this is one of the least entertaining films I've ever seen. Even the actors would agree; they are all so unbelievably horrible in this film that it is obvious that they had both a lack of direction and enthusiasm.

I did enjoy some of the post-production techniques, but the story constantly interrupted my enjoyment of them. If Rodriguez wanted to just expirement with them, he should have learned from Brakhage or Parajanov and made a film about that rather than about carnage.

I still do not understand how so many people I respect love this film (including Roger Ebert, Omar, and people I know in person, among others) which I absolutely despised.

Thug