This paper discusses the similarities between cinephilia and cult films based on an analysis of Tarantino's 2009 movie Inglourious Basterds. Cinephilia, whichemerged in the 1950s from the critique of the Frenchfilm magazine Cahiers du Cinéma [Notebooks on Cinema], legitimizes films outside the scope of Frenchhighbrow taste, and encompasses artworks theretofore considered of lesser importance. In this process, cinephilia creates a theory and a policy that place B grade movies on the list of highly artistic manifestations. In its own way, the cult film phenomenon also seeks to legitimize "poor taste" through social practices that prefer to cultivate "trash" rather than include it on the list of highbrow cultural goods. Tarantino provides a combination of the two forms of love of cinema, embracing at the same time that which is marginal and that which is high culture, in a postmodern shift of cultural boundaries.
cinephilia; cult movies; Quentin Tarantino