Movies: Kill Bill: Volume 1

Funky music, iconic shots, Uma with a sword and Tarantino’s fourth film – the trailer promised a lot, but infuriatingly, like so much studio propaganda today, the film failed to live up to its own hype.

Tarantino’s action-packed homage to the best of spaghetti westerns and kung-fu thrillers stars Uma Thurman as an ex-assassin taken out by her former colleagues – the Deadly Viper Assassination Squad: Bill (David Carradine), Vernita Green (Vivica A Fox), Budd (Michael Madsen), Elle Driver (Hannah) and O-Ren Ishii (Liu) – on her wedding day.

The Bride (Thurman), pregnant with Bill’s child, is left for dead after being shot in the head, along with the entire wedding party. Five years later she awakens from her coma, seeking revenge on the former colleagues that killed her baby and destroyed her life.
Split into two films because Tarantino ended up with far too much ‘good’ footage to waste, Kill Bill: Volume 1 is the prologue and beginning to a story that feels as though it’s yet to start. The story and characters are not nearly as involved or expertly scripted as Reservoir Dogs or Pulp Fiction – though this is typical of the modern action film, where plot and character morality are less important than thumping music, fast camera action and copious fight sequences… not that we don’t love this variety of action flick when done right.

Taking influences from samurai classics such as Shogun Assassin, Lady Whirlwind, Akira Kurosawa’s legendary Seven Samurai and Sergio Leone’s epic westerns (swapping six-shooters for double-edged swords), Kill Bill: Volume 1 fails to thrill for the most part. It is not until Thurman travels East to challenge newly self-elected Yakuza crime boss O-Ren Ishii that the film erupts into life, with Thurman in Bruce Lee’s famous one-piece yellow tracksuit, sword of vengeance in hand and the black-suited, Kato-mask wearing Crazy 88 gang standing in her way… they don’t stand a chance. “Those of you lucky enough to have your lives take them with you. However, leave the limbs you’ve lost. They belong to me now.” – The Bride’s chilling words after a mass blood fest that had to be filmed in black and white in order to get past the censors, blood gushing out all over the screen as if being hosed into the camera. Regrettably moments like this are far too few.

Sadly the effort put into the slicing and dicing of limbs is not echoed by the desire to give consumers much in the way of special features, with only a short making-of featurette, music videos and trailers the bonus material on this DVD release. Serious DVD collectors should consider waiting for the double-volume Kill Bill later this year.

Rating: I give it an 8.5. Great story line, Awesome fighting scenes, uma Thurman is pretty hot, and its an all around good to watch movie, except your going to have to watch Volume 2 after you see this one.