Ahead of the film's international release this week, German reviewers were rapturous over the fictitious squad of Nazi killers who stop the Holocaust and take brutal revenge, with some calling the picture "historic" and "important."

Only a handful expressed qualms over Tarantino's trademark gore-splattering, most relishing the cinematic massacre of the Nazi brass including Adolf Hitler by a band of Jewish-American soldiers, led by Brad Pitt, as deeply satisfying.

"'Inglourious Basterds' is brazen, a declaration of war, a pleasure," the normally staid Frankfurter Allgemeine daily said.

"Tarantino shows the Nazis as they really were: a pack of pompous trash -- thoroughly trivial bad guy