Kill
Bill Volume 2
Directed by Quentin Tarantino
USA 2004 18 R
Review by Jim Eadon
So here it is, (two tickets for what is essentially one movie later) the finale to
Vol
1. Thankfully
Kill Bill Vol 2 spares us from goofy
crosseyed girly villains. There is, of course, Darryl Hannah to deal with, but she's not in the slightest
bit girly. She is so visceral that you can't help but regret that Hannah didn't play
The Bride herself. She
would have elevated the role to iconic, and opposed to the am dram stuff from Uma.
To my mind, both female roles are essentially
the same character. They are assassins, extremely
psychopathic, bitches, unfeminine and utterly
without saving graces. Indeed,
Kill Bill doesn't
work on a critical level because in the same
way that the protagonists feel no empathy whatsoever,
it is likewise impossible to give a mosquito
shit about them. Except for
Michael Masden's goon: he consisted of shades of grey
compared to the gallery of 1-D nutbags running amok
in the rest of this garish movie, which isn't saying a lot. This wouldn't matter,
but Tarantino seems to want us to cheer on Thurman's assassin,
and tries to ingratiate her to us.
So you are left with spectacle and some mildly amusing, but mostly tortured, dialogue. Tarantino's trade mark is
the imaginative set scene, and there are several in
Kill Bill Vol 2 that are stunning, and are the entire reason
for seeing the movie.
Like Vol 1, this movie is incredibly violent,
in Tarantino's stylised, derivative fashion.
There is one scene that was ripped off from
the grim yet superior, ultra disturbing
Henry,
Portrait Of A Serial Killer, which did make
me wince - not least because it reminded me
of the original Henry scene.
If you don't mind blood splattering murders,
Kill Bill Vol 2 is a fun movie. The confession of this sentiment makes
me feel a dashed bit uneasy. The movie is fast
food for the twenty first century soulless droid.
The thrills are glossy, playful, cheap and manipulatively
effective. It's a movie I hate to like.
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spoilers corner
Spoilers!!!!
Warning: this box contains a movie post-mortem analysis that freely gives away important plot twists and details. If you have not yet seen this movie and intend seeing it, avoid this spoilers box until afterwards. Bookmark the page, see the movie, see if you agree with my review then write an arsy comment saying I am talking total b*ll*cks :-)
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The very end of Kill Bill Vol 2 has The Bride labelled
"Mommy". I felt pity for her kid,
for its ghastly fate was to be brought up by
a ruthless, savage psycho, and psychos
lack the innate ability to empathise.
Uma is not the kind of "Mommy" I would wish on my worst enemy. Especially not on my worst enemy!
The Henry scene I referred to above is the one with the eyeball destruction antics.
It was off the scale as far as demands upon suspension of disbelief go, but the coffin scene was great. If that was not ripped off from some
other movie, it was a creative bit of movie making.
The manner of Bill's demise is foreshadowed
so strongly, they might have well have
put it in the Trailer. The scene didn't
work anyway, pure melodrama.
The cute Superman speech was badly placed
in the climax, it drained away the atmosphere.
No real villain worth his salt would
prattle on about some stupid comic hero,
he's not supposed to be a sad fanboy
geek: such things invite thoughts that
Tarantino was either over-doing it on
the cute media self-references front,
or maybe he fancies himself as Bill
and projects his geekiness thither.
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There are no more spoilers below this
point, except maybe in any user talkback
comments.
End of spoilers corner
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Something a bit less foreshadowed
Add your comment to this page
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| From: |
alison | Subject: | 2004-06-25 23:00:46 |
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| From: |
rick | Subject: | 2004-08-19 21:54:59 |
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Kill
Bill Vol 1
