SPOILERS

I don’t know why I’m warning for spoilers, lol, the movie’s titled Kill Bill for heck’s sake. But hey, you’ve been warned rolls eyes.

“AKA Mommy” I could just sigh and end this review right there. The first time I saw this movie, I found Bill’s ‘all fall down’ death something of an anti-climax. But just like the last time I watched Vol. 1, the real story came through even stronger on this viewing than ever before, and I imagine that it will only move me more with every viewing. These movies are about a mother and a daughter. Bill’s death ain’t the reason we’re here. And if you want another reason why the way he drops dead makes sense, just look at the earlier scene of Bill and B.B. playing. Tarantino really went over this whole thing to iron out the creases.

It’s just a beautiful movie, I really don’t want to say any more than that right now. I’ve so many things to say, I’d have to do a fan commentary to purge my thoughts.

Oh yeh, and dammit, Uma Thurman deserved not only Annette Bening’s nomination at the Oscars, but the Oscar itself

22nd April 2004:

Boy do I hate beginning, “Where do I begin on this movie?” when I write about a movie but so many movies lately are eliciting this reaction in me when I come to review them. The Kill Bill volumes are what Tarantino’s fans and cinephiles in general expect. It’s no surprise that after barely a week’s release, Vol. 2, as it seems to be officially titled (from the trailer, opening titles, and BBFC certificate), is in the IMDb’s top 250 list.

Like Volume 1, Vol. 2 is a Frankenstein’s monster of a movie, using music as varied from The RZA’s and Robert Rodriguez’s originals to old movie soundtracks (plenty of Ennio Morricone this time round) to little heard cover versions of famous songs, using even more film stocks here than Volume 1 – Robert Richardson also photographed the non-Tarantino-directed Tarantino scripted movie Natural Born Killers which utilised multiple film stocks in an MTV style, but here, the stocks and visual styles are separated mostly into the chapters of the movie. Tarantino takes this visual trickery one step further in Vol. 2, he even switches aspect ratio at one point to tremendous effect.

I don’t know what Quentin Tarantino is going to do next to surprise us, but I trust he really has a lot up his sleeves. In Reservoir Dogs, he started on the dialogue, the Madonna speech, and used a few structural techniques to tell his story. In Pulp Fiction he launched an entire world, with Big Kahuna burgers and Red Apple cigarettes, furthering his structure ideas and pretty much creating the images and style he will probably be forever remembered for. With Jackie Brown he took someone else’s material and went more into homage land visually, with plenty of nods to Jean-Luc Godard as I recall. In Kill Bill: Vol. 1 he took that way beyond, opening with Shaw Brother’s title cards and using music cues much more blatantly. Here, he comes up with his greatest invention yet: the emotional peak of this movie comes in an end title. Before the end credits go to a black scrolling screen, there are at least 2 superficial credits sequences, one of which could easily be an alternate trailer, one of which could easily be an alternate opening titles for the complete movie, and Uma Thurman’s final credit (*SPOILER* “a.k.a. The Bride a.k.a. Black Mamba a.ka. Beatrix Kiddo a.k.a. Mommy”) is pure genius, superimposed as it is over Beatrix and B.B. driving to safety together. I’m amazed that I reacted to the ending of this movie (before the end titles, which obviously weren’t scripted) the same as I did to the script. There’s so much written in the script I read that is traditionally bad screenwriting, it’s hype, saying rather than showing (*SPOILER* specifically, the tears that issue from Beatrix in the final motel scene while she’s in the bathroom and B.B.’s watching cartoons) But Tarantino makes it work. Uma must win an Oscar for this role, she just MUST. “The lioness has
been reunited with her cub, and all is right in the jungle.” This movie is not subtle, but it is legend.

Vol. 2 is way slower than Kill Bill: Vol. 1, and much longer too. And the change in style is sufficient enough to justify Tarantino’s comment that it would really be too much for one viewing, even if that was his original wish. I would still love to see the whole thing without intermediary credits, but like I said in my review of Volume 1, there is at least one thing, the cliffhanger, that would be missed if I watched the movie that way. There is room for many versions of this movie because there are so many layers to it. I truly feel this is what Tarantino has been working towards in all his movies, and it’s basically a novel onscreen. And not an adaptation of a novel that skimps on the detail and simplifies concepts and merges characters and events, this is like an adaptation of a mammoth story that skimps on no detail, character or event, yet whizzes by nevertheless, because somehow, and only Tarantino could do this I’m sure, it switches so effortlessly between moments and styles and genres. The Showdown at Blue Leaves in Volume 1 was a preview of this, the number of music cues and emotions etc… but Vol. 2 goes way beyond. This movie, whether you take one volume at a time or both together, is that unique thing, it’s about everything, and it succeeds phenomenally. This is going to be absolutely, infinitely, rewatchable.

This entry was posted on Wednesday, January 18th, 2006 at 12:22 am in 5 hearts, Movie Reviews. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.