Tuckerscreator
(4 Score & 7 Years Ago)
Mar 14th 2013 at 2:56:16 AM
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Landa actually calls everyone who is under him "Hermann", as written in the article's One-Steve Limit entry. The guy could have been any random mook.
Larkmarn
Since: Nov, 2010
Mar 14th 2013 at 5:30:38 AM
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Not really. The point of killing the guy was showing that Landa was not going to get away scot-free, which is why he went off on the Basterds. If they went back on the deal enough to kill the guy who was supposed to go free, then what will they do with him? Give him an ice cream cone? He was a Redshirt through and through. Just there to be killed to show the stakes.
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AVClub
Since: Sep, 2019
Sep 15th 2019 at 9:51:55 AM
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One thing to support the theory is Aldo would then use the word “pecker eating” when he talked about what Landa would be doing in the US.
So, do we have a verdict on the Hans Landa's sexuality? Of course, it doesn't affect the story much, if at all, but it's an intriguing inquiry given Landa's allegiance to a rather intolerant enterprise.
I think he was gay/bi, and I don't need to rely on any of the obvious, stereotyping "evidence" (mannerisms, cultured-ness, etiquette, etc.) I'll rely on only Exhibit "A," which was obvious to some folks, and completely lost on others. It occurs literally in the film's final moments:
After Raine gets freed in the woods, he kills Herman, the soldier standing next to Landa. Landa rages not at the mere violation of terms, but at Herman's death. For the first and only time, we see Landa exhibit empathy, emotion, and compassion for another. Herman was the ONLY man for whose life Landa "made a deal with the general" to be freed along with Landa. Landa had already bargained for a fully set-up life in America, and all it needed was a partner — Herman.
Or, Herman could've just been Landa's loyal right-hand man, and Landa felt obligated to free him for Herman's loyalty and service. However, he was just a radio operator, not an assistant or a batman. Or, since Herman was a witness to Landa's scheme, Landa perhaps bargained for Herman's immunity, and in exchange Herman would stay silent. But Landa arguably would've been ambivalent to, or supportive of, Herman's execution, then.
The only other possibility is that Herman was Landa's relative — otherwise, these signs point to Landa being a closeted bi/homosexual, and his lover was Herman. This would've had the added bonus of adding MOTIVE to Landa's surrender (i.e., escaping a regime that is uber intolerant of gays)
Otherwise, why include the scene at all? If it does none of the above, then the Herman scenes are pointless. Erase Herman's killing. Erase Landa's rage and empathy. None of it advanced the plot, and IB would've been exactly the same movie without it. But Herman's inclusion subtly verifies, or at least suggests, that Landa was gay, and provides extra motive for Landa's defection/surrender.
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