Plot
In 1941, Austrian SS-Standartenführer Hans Landa interrogates French dairy farmer Perrier LaPadite about a fugitive Jewish family, the Dreyfuses. He boasts his nickname, "The Jew Hunter", then offers LaPadite amnesty if he will give up the Dreyfuses. LaPadite tearfully admits that the family is hiding under his floor. Landa's men massacre the Dreyfuses, but one of them, young Shosanna, escapes unharmed.
Three years later, U.S. Army lieutenant Aldo Raine recruits Jewish American soldiers to the "Basterds", a black ops commando unit tasked with instilling fear among Nazis in occupied France by killing and scalping them. The group includes Sergeant Donny "The Bear Jew" Donowitz, privates first class Smithson Utivich and Omar Ulmer, rogue German sergeant Hugo Stiglitz, and Austrian-born translator Corporal Wilhelm Wicki. Raine leaves a swastika mark on surviving German soldiers so they cannot hide their Nazi affiliations after the war.
Shosanna now operates a cinema in Paris under the name Emmanuelle Mimieux and meets Fredrick Zoller, a famed German sniper set to star in the German propaganda film Stolz der Nation (Nation's Pride). Infatuated with "Emmanuelle", Zoller convinces Joseph Goebbels to hold the film's premiere at her cinema. Landa, the premiere's head of security, interrogates Shosanna, but does not reveal whether or not he knows her. She plots with her Afro-French lover and projectionist, Marcel, to kill the German leaders by burning down the cinema with her collection of highly flammable nitrate films.
British Commando Lieutenant Archie Hicox, a former film critic and fluent German speaker, is recruited for Operation Kino, a covert attack on the premiere of Nation's Pride in Paris. In the briefing, Hicox is informed that several members of the German High Command will attend the premiere, including Goebbels, Göring, Bormann and many officers of the SS and Gestapo. The objective of Operation Kino is to set off an explosion to take them all out at once. Hicox is informed he will rendezvous with the Basterds and German film star Bridget von Hammersmark, an undercover Allied agent.
Disguised as German officers, Hicox, Stiglitz, and Wicki meet with von Hammersmark in an occupied town at a tavern unexpectedly full of German soldiers. They sit down and play the German card game Wer bin ich? together. Hicox's unusual accent catches the attention of Wehrmacht sergeant Wilhelm and SS-Sturmbannführer Dieter Hellström, who joins Hicox's group when his suspicions are aroused. Hicox and von Hammersmark convince him they are genuine, but Hicox blows their cover with a non-German hand gesture. Everyone is killed in the ensuing gunfight except Wilhelm and a wounded von Hammersmark. Raine negotiates with Wilhelm for von Hammersmark's release until she shoots Wilhelm dead.
Believing she set his men up, Raine tortures von Hammersmark, but she convinces him of her loyalty and reveals that Adolf Hitler himself will be attending the premiere. The mission goes ahead with Raine, Donowitz, and Ulmer posing as Italian filmmakers. Von Hammersmark is doubtful but thinks the Germans will not find their Italian accents suspicious. Landa investigates the tavern and finds von Hammersmark's shoe and a napkin with her signature, which she had previously signed as a gift for Wilhelm's newborn son.
The Basterds infiltrate the premiere with timed explosives. Landa, fluent in the Italian language, sees through their cover and confronts von Hammersmark privately, strangling her to death. He has Raine arrested along with Utivich, whom he has also detected, but leaves Ulmer and Donowitz in the cinema. Interrogating Raine and Utivich, Landa reveals that he knows all about the attack taking place at the theater. Taking advantage of the situation, Landa offers to let the attack proceed if Raine's OSS commanders will guarantee his safety along with great riches for himself after the war. Raine contacts his commanders, and Landa negotiates a generous deal for himself and his radio operator.
During the screening, Zoller meets with Shosanna in the projection booth. When she's unsuccessful at driving him away, she shoots Zoller in the back. Checking on his body, Zoller shoots Shosanna. Both die on the floor as the film continues playing. As Nation's Pride reaches its climax, Shosanna's face appears on the screen telling the Nazi audience in English that they are about to be killed by a Jew. Having locked the auditorium, Marcel ignites a pile of nitrate film behind the screen, setting the theater ablaze. Ulmer and Donowitz break into the opera box, fatally shoot Hitler and Goebbels, then begin firing into the crowd. The timed explosives, previously hidden by Landa on the balcony, detonate, killing everyone inside.
Landa and his radio operator drive Raine and Utivich to Allied territory, where they surrender to Raine. After being handcuffed by Utivich for the surrender, Raine, to Landa's shock, shoots the radio operator. Unsatisfied that Landa will be able to take off his uniform and renounce his identity as a Nazi without consequence, Raine proposes to give him something that he "can't take off". Aldo then triumphantly carves a swastika into Landa's forehead, declaring it to be his masterpiece.
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