Skip to main content

Quentin Tarantino month: Kill Bill Vol 1 & 2

A review by Chris Lee
Ah, Quentin Tarantino. Hollywood’s weird, eccentric brother. When Tarantino is in the room, you know he’s in the room. His films carry an identity too-often poorly parodied, and rarely mistakable. Personally, I’ve enjoyed every single one of the man’s ventures, minus Jackie Brown, which I just haven’t seen. (Editors Note: See? I told you it's the forgotten Tarantino)
Of the films I have seen, and, being an action-film connoisseur, I have to say, Kill Bill Vol. 1 & 2, which I consider a single film, is my very favorite. 
The 2003/2004 action drama follows “The Bride”, a character devised on the set of Pulp Fiction by Tarantino and BFF Uma Thurman. The Bride is out for revenge against her former allies, all of whom were part of a clan of highly-skilled assassin’s, known as the Deadly Viper Assassination Squad, managed by the ruthless and titular “Bill”.
I’ll leave the reason for her revenge out, as it’s revealed early on, and is compelling enough for anyone who can empathize with other human beings on hopefully the most basic levels. What follows is an in media res, non-linear adventure that succinctly covers and explores each member of the former squad, their part in The Bride’s journey for revenge, and their feelings about the betrayal they committed. 
Containing some of the best fight choreography in modern cinema, Kill Bill is a visual/audio treat. While the film does suffer some pacing issues due to certain expository scenes, everything supports everything else to develop a rich world that’s believable as existing just underneath our own. Uma Thurman’s driven performance as the Bride instantly earns her character’s sympathy, even as she slices and dices her way through countless goons and her former friends. I feel safe in saying that The Bride sits up with Sarah Connor and Ellen Ripley as one of the all-time great action-movie heroes. 

When watching Vol. 1 and 2, be sure to set aside time to watch both back to back. The journey is a bit long, but completely worth it, standing as a contemporary epic that will forever be one of the greatest western martial arts/revenge films ever made.



Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Forgotten Film Friday: Absolute Power

Clint Eastwood stars as Luther Whitney, a jewel thief who works in the Washington DC area. One night while he is stealing from a mansion he is forced to hide in a secret compartment with a two way mirror. From there he observes a sexual rezendevous with the wife of a powerful man and the President of the United States Alan Richmond (Gene Hackman) Suddenly the president gets aggressive and while defending herself the woman is shot to death by two Secret Service agents. Luther manages to get away with a letter opener the woman stabbed the president with. At first Luther plans to flee the country. But when he is disgusted by a statement the president makes, Luther decides to expose the crime. I miss these kind of films. The nineties was a great time for thrillers exactly like this. They are not the flashiest films but they are also not obsessed with big action scenes. It's all plot and character with them. Sure this plot might be a little out there but Eastwood makes it work. He's...
1 comment
Read more

John Candy month

 What can you say about John Candy? He was a comic genius who was taken from us too soon. There were a lot of comedic heavyweights of the eighties and nineties but Candy stood above most of them. If there is a Mount Rushmore of comedy I imagine John Candy would be on it. For the month of July we are honoring this comic genius. 
Post a Comment
Read more

Oscar bait month

 The Academy Awards. That time of the year when everyone debates what movies are truly the best and there is never a consensus and no one is ever happy. A movie can be incredibly popular and then it wins a bunch of Oscars and suddenly it's overrated and not very good or downright bad. It happens every year. But for the month of April let's take a look at those films that had Oscars on their mind and instead fell flat on their faces. Now Oscar Bait is a term that can also be applied to winners or films that did score a bunch of nominations. For example Bradley Cooper's film Maestro is very much an Oscar Bait movie even though it had a decent awards season. I want to talk about the films that did nothing. That were early contenders then either faded away eventually or just plain crashed and burned. Oscar Bait's biggest failures. What wrong here with these? Was the movie poor? Did something else just have a dominant run? Or were politics involved? Maybe all of the above. S...
Post a Comment
Read more