Speak Languages or Die! Translation and Conflict in Quentin Tarantino’s "Inglorious Basterds"

During international conflicts professional or amateur translators, including individuals who are fluent in a certain language, have become essential either in acquiring information, working as infiltrators, spies and informers, or in playing a specific role in negotiations and treaties. By adopting as a textual model Quentin Tarantino’s peculiar war movie Inglorious Basterds, based as it is on a clash between nations, cultures, and languages in which translators and mediating figures play a pivotal role, we will investigate the relationship between language, translation, mistranslation, fluency, and conflicts. In our analysis we will focus on three specific episodes that highlight the terse relationship between national language, mistranslation, and conflict.