I watched this duology today in HD on a TV (to do it some more justice than my laptop screen). It was fucking awesome. Well worth my initial frustrations at getting the right wires in the right place. I’d only seen the first chapter or so of the first film before, so this was the first time seeing everything, in high res no doubt, to appreciate the full blood-spraying-sword-flinging-limb-cutting fiasco of a film this is. Volume 1.
After seeing Inglourious Basterds, the style of simple font and wonderful song during the opening credits was no surprise. “The 4th film by Quentin Tarantino” is drawn open with Nancy Sinatra’s “Bang Bang”. Following on from the black and white scene at the beginning, this song perfectly captures the essence of the film with its lyrics and stylish way of presenting such themes of murder and violence. Once again, QT tells a story with chapters, this time ten in total, out of chronological order, as in many of his films. Kill Bill is about revenge, killing and not a lot else. Four years ago, “The Bride” (Uma Thurman) aka *BEEP* aka Black Mamba aka Beatrix Kiddo was the target of the Deadly Viper Assassination Squad, and was left for dead and pregnant at her wedding rehearsal in El Paso, Texas. Unknown to the Squad, she clung on to her life, and was comatose for 4 years. In the present, she has awoken, and intent on getting her revenge on each Squad member, all whom are scrawled out on her hit list. The first chapter shows how she kills her second victim, Vernita Green (Vivica Fox) aka Copperhead, in her home. In the middle of their fight, Vernita’s daughter comes home from school, disturbing the mini blood fest. The Bride and Vernita schedule a knife fight later that night, but the Bride kills Vernita before she leaves the house, in view of Vernita’s daughter. Driving off in her Pussy Wagon (taken from a male hospital nurse). This opening chapter, full of saturated colouring is a good attention grabber. The suburban house, in the perfect colourful neighbour hood so suddenly turned into a bloody fight location. There’s slight wariness during the two women's ‘normal’ conversation, as they go from trying to kill each other to making cups of tea etc. You sense some kind of respect between the two, yet they are both in a position to kill the other. Obviously, as one of them ends up dead.
The rest of Vol. 1 is concentrated mostly on the Bride’s hunt for her first victim, O-ren Ishii (Lucy Liu) aka Cottonmouth, a yakuza leader in Tokyo.
Her past is told through a short anime section in the film, a style very fitting for the asian character. In a sketchy drawing style, the anime shows how O-ren witnessed her parent’s murder by a yakuza boss. Little do you expect that the spurting of blood from severed limbs is actually brought to life later in the film.. A first taste of the gore to come. This anime sequence paints a vivid image of O-ren, a deadly assassin who has little mercy. The Bride obtains a brand new kick-ass samurai sword from a renowned swordsmith Hattori Hanzo, who breaks his blood oath to never create a sword for killing, and then continues to Tokyo to hunt down O-ren Ishii. O-ren’s entourage of lawyer Sofie Fatale (Julie Dreyfus), bodyguard Gogo Yubari (Chiaki Kuriyama) and henchmen The Crazy 88 is introduced, and you immediately get a sense of Ishii’s power and superior social status. The confrontation happens at the House of Blue Leaves, where some j-rock girl band called the 5,6,7,8’s are performing – albeit some pop culture songs such as “Woo Hoo”, probably to QT’s delight. The fight scenes here are incredible, especially when the lights are turned out, and you see the silhouettes of the Bride and some henchmen fight it out with a beautiful blue backdrop – one of my favourite scenes. Some of the fight in the courtyard is filmed in black and white, making the transition to colour later on so much more powerful when you see the pools of red blood splattering the place. 
The best fight in my opinion is between the Bride and Gogo, the bodyguard. Gogo, a 17 year old Japanese school girl, who is dressed as so, is introduced as “What she lacks in age, makes up for in madness”. Her stares, and indifferent style of dialogue just reinforces this statement. Even her giggly schoolgirl mouth-behind-hand laugh is just so genuine, yet straight after she delivers deep, menacing words to challenge her attacker. The way she fights too, is somewhat graceful and effortless – swinging her mace back and forth it’s like she’s dancing. The fight with this anime-inspired character builds up to the final fight, which takes place outside in an oriental garden. It is snowing. Reminds me of House of Flying Daggers. O-ren is elegant and mysterious. She and the Bride clash swords, and in the end the Bridge gets her revenge by scalping her opponent. Not as much action as I’d like in this scene, but you get a sense of the characters’ respect/closeness, as O-ren apologises for humiliating the Bride, the Bride’s sadness for O-ren’s death, as well as the “Silly Rabbit, Trix are for Kids” inside joke between the two women. The first volume ends with Sofie Fatale informing Bill (David Carradine) about the Bride’s plans. Bill asks whether the Bride knows that her daughter is alive… DUNDUNDUN. 
It leaves you wanting for more. The action, the gore, the dymanic characters. Bill’s face isn’t even shown in this film, leaving the viewer aching for more plot, less mystery. Tarantino continues using his signature style of continuous filming, wonderful close ups, and great dialogue to keep the tension up. What really impressed me in Volume 1 was the use of high contrast black and white scenes – especially during the fights. The soundtrack once again was very complementary, with Spanish guitar rhythms and pop culture tunes being woven perfectly into this film. Tarantino has been able to draw together the best from several different genres, such as martial art films, spaghetti westerns and Japanese anime. The Bride’s name is bleeped out at first, and her names are slowly revealed as the film wears on. This mirrors the amount of information you know about her, so the viewer really feels like they are getting to know her more as the film(s) deepen. It’s weird. Tarantino lets you know that O-ren is killed right at the beginning of the film, yet it doesn’t stop you from watching. It just shows that it’s not about how it ends, but what happened in between. Anyways, on to… Volume 2.
Continuing in the same style and structure as Volume 1, the film opens with the Bride on her way to Bill’s, the last on her hit list. Again, Tarantino gives us some of the ending, take it or leave it. Of course I take it, and continue watching. In black and white, we are given a detailed account of what happened at the wedding rehearsal massacre. How the Bride has taken up an alter ego to marry a man, so that her unborn daughter (who is Bill’s) will lead a safe life, away from all this violence and killing. Bill appears at the rehearsal, and this is the first time we see his mug. Old, wrinkly, yet not old enough to be incapable. He has an air of importance. That’s all that’s revealed in this scene, apart from the fact that he and the Bride are very close.
Somewhere in the desert, Bill visits his brother, Budd (Michael Madsen) aka Sidewinder, warning him about the Bride’s plans to kill them all. Budd is now an alcoholic bouncer at a “titty bar” (lol). The Bride ambushes his trailer at night, however he is ready, and shoots her with rock salt and then sedates her. Claiming to have pawned his own Hanzo sword, he takes hers and offers to sell it to the 4th member of the Squad, Elle Driver (Daryl Hannah), for $1 million. Budd then proceeds to bury the Bride alive, in a grave for Paula Schultz.
Cutting back to her training in China, we see that the Bride studied under Pai Mei, an elderly martial arts master who hates caucasians, americans, and women. The Bride just happens to tick all those boxes. Pai Mei is able to perform the Five Point Palm Exploding Heart Technique (self explanatory) which he teaches no one, not even Bill. Pai Mei is portrayed as the stereotypical martial arts master –white haired, long flowing beard, crazy-ass eyebrows, stupid temper - you name it. It definitely adds some comical value to this part of the film. Anyways, the Bride remembers her training with the master, and recalls it to get out of her coffin. Meanwhile, eye-patched Elle has arrived at Budd’s place with a case of money – and a Black Mamba hiding inside it. Needless to say he dies, leaving Elle to claim that she killed the Bride. The Bride returns, fresh from the ground. Cue girl-on-girl fight! Elle reveals that she lost her eye because Pai Mei plucked it out when she insulted him, in which she responded by poisoning him. So the Bride plucks out her other one, leaving her to flail like an eyeless helpless fish. The fight between these two is highly entertaining, making use of the weak walls you get in trailers etc.. Four down, one to go. Arriving at Bill aka Snake Charmer’s place, Beatrix finds Bill and her daughter, BB playing together. Surprisingly, BB is expecting her mother’s return, saying that she was waiting for her to “wake up”. It’s evident that Bill has brought up BB to be aware of life, death and killing – as she watches “Shogun Assassin” before bed. The conversation regarding BB stomping on her goldfish Emilio is a bit disturbing, especially as it is told in the calmest of ways, as if nothing is wrong with 4 year old killing her pets. An example of the interesting dialogue in this film. After BB sleeps, Beatrix is shot with truth serum, and reveals that she chose to protect her unborn
daughter instead of continuing killing people for Bill. He respond by saying how he thought she was dead, and maybe “overreacted” when he found out that she was alive. Despite all this, Beatrix is intent on finishing him off. They fight and uses a secret move taught to her by Pai Mei (no need for a second try to guess which one). Dying proudly, Bill takes 5 steps and falls. Beatrix sheds a tear. Happy ending. Volume 2 has a lot more plot and substance compared to the bloody Volume 1, so in that instance it’s actually quite different. In the end, it turned quite into a mother-does-anything-to-protect-daughter kind of sad story, instead of the revenge filled hate-tale that Volume 1 prepared us for, but that doesn’t mean that Tarantino doesn’t deliver. The dialogue in Volume 2 is a lot more significant in making this a QT classic. More high contrast black and white filming and long shots following characters as they move through a scene make this a lot more interactive with the audience. Bill’s mystery is lost in this Volume, yet you still wonder how such a killer is able to bring up a child. The way Tarantino continually challenges his characters is really something I admire. Uma Thurman is really fantastic in this series, along with Chiaki Kuriyama’s Gogo Yubari, they are my favourite characters. Lucy Liu was also a million times better here than in Charlie’s Angels, fersure. The juxtaposition of genres shines through, and the effective structuring of the chapters makes this a very exciting film indeed. Ahh, I really loved these films, definitely glad I got them in HD.
No comments:
Post a Comment