Kill Bill: Volume 2 (2004)

"That woman deserves her revenge... and we deserve to die."

Kill Bill is Quentin Tarantino’s first [well second if you count From Dusk till Dawn (1996)] tribute to the films of a “grindhouse” cinema. This film is a revenge story that’s jam-packed full of references to different films from all across the scope of cinema: different genres, cultures and styles. Kill Bill: Volume 2 (2004) continues the story of the Bride on her quest to, well, kill... Bill. Where Volume 1 is questions, Volume 2 is fortunately answers.

If you remember (all the way back to yesterday) my biggest problem with Kill Bill: Volume 1 (2003) is that its story doesn't work on its own as a film. Well Volume 2 totally fixed that. This film starts by introducing a frame story of the Bride on her final drive to Bill's home. This changes the story so that the bride is narrating and explaining everything she's been through as she's on her way to her anticipated final destination. This makes me question why we didn't start with a frame in the beginning of the first film, then we could have cut back to it for a cliffhanger at the ending, but who am I to tell Tarantino how to order his films right? Maybe the frame opening to this film is the actual opening to the first film if we saw both films back to back? *cough*don't hold your breath*cough* Well whatever the reason, this makes this film work right from the beginning better than the way the last one ended. (Yay!)

I also want to mention how much I love the Bill character in this film. In the hands of most other directors, he would have stayed an aloof mystery as he was in the first film, but nope instead the character comes in (really not until) the ending and becomes one of the coolest and most interesting characters of the entire movie(s). Now I'm sure some of this coolness is thanks impart to the awesomeness of the late David Caradine, but still this should be proof that you can have an awesome antagonist even with only a little actual screen time.

Volume 1 has a great soundtrack, but personally I really like Volume 2's better. The Spanish style guitar, (some of which provided by director Robert Rodriguez) really is the cherry on top for this film. And the credit sequence is just plain cool. It' really makes me wish these were released together as one film, because no matter how hard your butt hurts that credit sequence with the full curtain call and the amazing music rolls, would make it totally worth it.

I admit this is nitpicky, but I noticed that if you watch this film on it's own the Pai Mei flashback really sticks out because the first film is very decidedly "asian" in feel, and this film is much more "western," thanks in part, mostly to the settings (Texas, California desert, etc.) The Pai Mei scenes will work as a nice connector between the otherwise very different "in feel" films but as it is now it kinda seems out of place. Don't get me wrong, I love the Pai Mei scenes, and I think they're introduced in a really, really great way (during the buried alive sequence) just an observation.

I liked the fight scenes in the first film, this film somehow manages to plus them! As would be natural, in one film the fight scenes in the first half pale in comparison to the second half, the fights in this film are far more interesting, clever and unique in my opinion. I love how the Pai Mei sequence is a direct throwback to Shaw Brothers kung-fu films, and I love how the fight with Elle in Budd's trailer is very "Jackie Chan-esque" in that they use a lot of the surroundings in the trailer to fight and I love the gag in the first part where Elle can't even pull out her Hanzo sword without hitting a trailer wall. And I know its short and abrupt but the climactic fight with Bill is really awesome to me, I love how they talk for ever and ever and then it's over in almost a flash. Very cool.

I think the "buried alive" sequence is possibly the most suspenseful piece of film in the last decade (or two!) I absolutely love how it goes completely dark for quite a while and all you can hear is the sounds of being buried alive, and then when she turns on the flashlight underground, the frame is suddenly black and white. Super clever, stylish and effective all in one!

But what I really love in this film is the story. Everything I thought was lacking in the first, improves tenfold in this. I love how the film basically builds its own modern mythology with these characters (specifically the Bride) and I love how the story pays off in the end. I really like how the reveal (not a twist because the audience already knew) to the Bride that her daughter is still alive almost completely unhinges the story we were following, and suddenly her revenge takes a backseat to her daughter. Then she goes to talk to Bill and realizes he's still kind of an a-hole and that he does in fact deserve to die for what he did, still.

Kill Bill: Volume 2 (2004) is everything I was missing in Volume 1, and then some. 5/5 Stars.

Happy watching!

Check out this original minimalist poster design I did for this film, click through to buy prints/posters etc. OR check out other movie posters I designed here. :)

Want more Tarantino goodness? Check back all month for my Tribute to Tarantino in honor of his latest film Django Unchained (2012).

Go back to Tarantino's first film with Reservoir Dogs (1992), check out the first script he wrote (but didn't direct) True Romance (1993), The smash hit that really put him on the map Pulp Fiction (1994), another film written by him but in the hands of another director From Dusk till Dawn (1996), his blaxploitation-influenced crime film Jackie Brown (1997) or the first half of this story Kill Bill: Volume 1 (2003). I got films planned all month, so be sure to check back!



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From Dusk till Dawn (1996)

"Fight now, cry later."

From Dusk till Dawn (1996) is a violent crime/horror exploitation film directed by Robert Rodriguez. Much like True Romance (1993) this is one of only a couple of films written by Quentin Tarantino, that he didn't actually direct. He wrote the screenplay very early on and in a very short time span (in two weeks!) with the intent to sell. People would call him up and tell him they loved it, but no one actually wanted to make it. When everyone passed on it Quentin's good friend Robert Rodriguez expressed interest and they decided to go forward with it.

The story follows the bank-robbing Gecko brothers on a killing spree as they try to escape the police and cross the border to Mexico, they hijack a family's RV and everything is going well but things take a drastic turn for the worse once they get into Mexico.

(Special spoiler warning for this one: If you want the full experience of this film don't read on any further. This film has a drastic twist halfway through and I'm going to talk about it bellow.)

The script for From Dusk till Dawn is really clever. The film starts out as a pretty typical 'bank-robbers-on-the-run' heist-type film that halfway through completely shifts tone and becomes a very gruesome horror film much like the exploitation horror films of the later 70s through the 80s. The shift is very weird but also clever and unique. What I like about it is how completely the script shifts and almost before the viewer knows it, they're in a completely different movie.

I like how well thought-out the characters are: a preacher whose recently lost his faith, a professional bankrobber who's stuck with his sex-offender brother. This is less so for the characters introduced in the second half (the Vietnam vet and Sex Machine the very typical biker bar patron), but with the genre shift it almost actually fits. The characters introduced later almost follow different rules because of the change of tone in the film.

And the film is packed with (now-classic) Tarantino dialogue. I really like the way the characters talk in this film and it's filled with lots of really memorable lines: "I said 'plant yourself.' Plants don't talk." and "What's in Mexico?" with the very memorable answer "Mexicans."

The genre shift in the film really leaves some awkward pacing, this is especially noticeable in the second half of the film though where all the action kind of happens in waves giving the characters these long breaks to talk about things between monster attacks.

Luckily his part is pretty minor, but the Asian adopted son of Harvey Keitel, Ernest Liu really just a nothing-special child actor and kind of sticks out like a sore thumb surrounded by all these other really great actors in this film.

And lastly I really don't care for the ending of this film. Its not fulfilling or satisfying at all and seems pretty meaningless. Tarantino has done meaningless endings before, but this one seems un-stylish and like they had nothing else they could think of to end on. What does the end establish? George Clooney's character isn't that bad of a guy? Yeah, the whole movie established that.

This film has one of the greatest opening sequences I've ever seen. The film starts so nonchalantly, then out of nowhere turns into a cut-throat hostage situation that's stylish funny and very interesting. It's 11 minutes long too! That's pretty intense for an opening to a film.

I love the camerawork in this film. Robert Rodriguez really knows how to direct a camera, he said that he actually emulated the way Quentin would frame a shot during specific scenes in this movie. But I gotta say, I think I like the cinematography in this film a lot more than I do in most Tarantino films!

And almost all the acting in this film is really sound, but the two actors that stand out are the two opposite leads George Clooney and Harvey Keitel. It's hard to even conceive this today but back in 1996 George Clooney was a huge actor on the small screen on E.R. but had never been in a movie before. Rodriguez and Tarantino saw the potential and cast him in a completely different role than he usually had and as a result of this film, he was amazing and his career just took off afterwards. Harvey Keitel is just a great actor he just knows how to command the camera's presence in the film, but his role in this film is pretty different than anything I've ever seen him in, and he really nails it. It just shows how great of a range he has as an actor.

From Dusk till Dawn (1996) is a very fun and stylish film that is super clever and a great blend of multiple genres. 4/5 Stars.

Happy watching!





Want more Tarantino goodness? Check back all month for my Tribute to Tarantino in honor of his latest film Django Unchained.

Go back to Tarantino's first film with Reservoir Dogs (1992), check out the first script he wrote (but didn't direct) True Romance (1993) or The smash hit that really put him on the map Pulp Fiction (1994.



Like this blog? You can support it by buying this film through these links: