KILL BILL (2003) Encore Channel played this one tonight. Really like this one. The style, music, and action where all excellence. The whole restaraunt scene between Thurman and Lucy Lu. They even played music from the Spaghetti Western DEATH RIDES A HORSE. First time I ever saw this film and I really liked it. Now I have to see the second part.
(http://adorocinema.cidadeinternet.com.br/filmes/kill-bill/kill-bill-poster09.jpg)
For me, the second one has a little less of the charm. That may be due to the first having some much of the setup in the plot, which I found incredibly fun. The backstory about the sword, her time in the hospital, etc. I spent much of the movie just trying to find my feet.
For me I think I enjoyed watching the first movie (or rather first half seeing how this was once one movie) but I think I got more out of the second part.
There's alot of mixed opinions I think on part 1 and 2. Really it's all meant to be the same long movie, but part 1 seems to contain most of the action and part 2 most of the plot. I like them both with part 1 being the favorite.
I liked both but one thing that bothered me was lack of balance. all action then all plot I felt took away.
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"We Greeks created democracy! You also created homos!"-Ghost World
Yes but part 2 did have a barefoot David Carradine philosophising about Superman while making a sandwich.
I absolutely love Part 1 of Kill Bill. I talked my wife into seeing it while on vacation on our anniversary back in October of 03. She hates kung fu films but had a blast with KB Part 1.
Unfortunatly, we missed Part 2 when it hit theaters and ended up renting it on DVD. It was pretty good, but nothing compared to Part 1. The story was great, but it was a bit of a let down after the action packed part 1. I have a feeling that if it was shown as one long flick, then it would go together quite nicely.
IMO part 2 has more character development. It's not as slick looking so it seems more like a QT film. It is also more giallo. I think we'll eventually see a QT horror flick soon. He toyed with some of the same material in his CSI episode. Like em both but I also agree that they are very different.
I liked both parts but less so than I thought I would. Since it was QT's big love letter to genre films, I had more fun playing "spot the influence/homage" than treating it like a movie. Although it was fun to read on IMDB all the things I missed or would have never known. Like that Sonny Chiba was playing yet another member of the Hattori Hanzo family, or just WHY Okinawa was a great place for him to hide out posing as a sushi chef. The fights were good especially the House of Blue Leaves battle (I must find the Lady Snowblood films) plus I usually loathe Lucy Liu so enjoyed how that turned out. I seem to be the only person I know who hated the anime sequence, I see why he put it in, but it just didn't work for me and seemed like he was trying too hard to add that part because it was anime-style.
I liked the second one a little better since we got to see Bill, and I'm a Carradine fan so any time he gets a good role in a non-direct to video flick I'm happy. It showed what a good actor he is that he could be that loving and funny with his daughter while still projecting the evil of what he was going turn her into; and then come across so oily and charming with Beatrice. I hated the "Superman" speech though. The training with Gordon Liu was a great tribute to those films and I actually hated to see what became of him even though it fit with the story. The burial scene really worked, I wanted it to end quickly since I could feel my claustrophobia acting up just watching.
I'd say I liked parts of it better than the sum total of the story from both films. Put it this way, I haven't been in a hurry to have a marathon viewing of both parts as one film since both hit DVD.
That anime sequence had some of the *best* sound work I've heard, ever. Those was serious meaty bonebreakin' fun.
I thought this movie was awful. It did not work on any level for me. I knew I was in trouble during the Daryl Hannah whistling bit.
The part where Blondie met the sword guy (Hanzo?) and they talked about her "vacation" for about ten minutes, then spent about ten more minutes on him soul-searching before he agreed to make her a sword, had me begging my date to just leave.
The anime sequence was a waste of time. WHO CARES ABOUT O-REN ISHI? She's just going to die (which was made apparent in the first five minutes), so the part with her backstory came off as pure filler. (Although her Dad was the only character I liked in the movie.) And, argh, when she had the sword stuck in the old pedophile Yakuza guy and he was spurting gallons and gallons of blood while she was reminding him who she was. Gah! I hate hate HATE scenes like that.
And, oh man, after Blondie fought the Crazy 88 guys she had to make a SPEECH. Ugh! Like they're even listening to you, you numb ****!
Then there were the random "what the?" bits like every seat on Blondie's plane having a sword scabbard attached to it, and the irritating spaghetti western music.
I could go on, but suffice it to say I hated every single frame of this movie, and I really don't know what Mr. Tarantino was going for with it. It wasn't much like the old Kung-Fu or Japanese swordfight movies I used to watch on Saturdays, except for a few heavy handed "bad edits" and the like. So it didn't click as an homage or a spoof.
(Actually, Kill Bill does work on one level. If I imagine that Quentin Tarantino tapped into my mind and found out how to make a movie specifically for me not to like, he achieved that goal.)
I can't believe I'm defending and expalining a film I was only lukewarm for.
The Darryl Hannah whistling in the hospital bit was a tribute to giallos and old suspense films. Even the tune she was whistling was from a film called "Death Nerve" I think.
The anime bit and O-ren's backstory was supposed to help flesh out the cycle of young girls and women having their innocence and their lives destroyed, becoming human killing machines to get vengence or toughen up, only to become the very thing they hated and destroying the life of someone else who will grow up to do the same thing to them. That's why QT has said he wants to make a sequel down the line where the daughter of Vivica Fox's character grow up to get revenge on Kiddo (Uma Thurman). It's a never ending cycle.
The sword holders on the seats was a kind of joke explanation of how she could carry the sword on the plane. It's a genre film set in a world where carrying swords is common. He's explaining away something that the films he's "honoring" would glaze over or ignore.
Kiddo's speech and O-ren's interlude with the dying Yakuza again is copying films like the Lone Wolf and Cub series and others that were filled with stuff like this.
Hanzo and Kiddo on Okinawa was probably QT indulging himself to work with Sonny Chiba, one of his idols. If that scene has a greater significance concerning the Hattori Hanzo films, I don't know enough about those films to be aware of it. Anyone else have info there?
LIke I said before just treat it like a "spot the influence/homage" touchstone or his love letter to genre and grindhouse films he loves.