The Films of Quentin Tarantino: KIll Bill Volume II (2004)

Kill Bill: Vol. 2 (2004) 

Directed by: Quentin Tarantino.

Written by: Quentin Tarantino and Uma Thurman (Character)

Starring: Uma Thurman (The Bride / Beatrix Kiddo), David Carradine (Bill), Michael Madsen (Budd), Daryl Hannah (Elle Driver), Julie Dreyfus (Sofie Fatale), Sonny Chiba (Hattori Hanzo), Gordon Liu (Pai Mei), Bo Svenson (Reverend Harmony), Jeannie Epper (Mrs. Harmony), Chris Nelson (Tommy Plympton), Samuel L. Jackson (Rufus), Larry Bishop (Larry Gomez), Sid Haig (Jay), Michael Parks (Esteban Vihaio), Perla Haney-Jardine (B.B.), Helen Kim (Karen), Lucy Liu (O-Ren Ishii), Vivica A. Fox (Vernita Green),

 

Back in 2004, I was one of those people who thought that Kill Bill Volume 2 was better than Volume 1. It was and is a more typical Tarantino film than Volume 1 – with a lot more dialogue, a lot more digressions and side roads that it goes down, and it was a more emotional film – instead of just the pure rage of Volume 1, there are more layers to the emotions in Volume 2. Over the years, I changed my mind – Volume 1 is clearly the better film – and watching Volume 2 again, a few days after Volume 1, I wonder why I ever thought it was better. Don’t get me wrong – Volume 2 is still a great film, wonderfully staged and acted, and written and directed by Tarantino. And yet, it is a less focused film than Volume 1. It’s fun to go down all the side roads that Tarantino takes us down in the film – but watching it this time, I kind of realized that it’s almost entirely side roads.

 

The heart of the movie is really the first scene and the last scene in the film. The first sequence takes us back to that wedding chapel right before the massacre happened – that left everyone but The Bride (Uma Thurman) dead – but her in a coma. We first see her, her fiancé and her friends taking to the minister and his wife (and a cameo by a Tarantino favorite as the piano player) – but the heart of it is a long conversation between The Bridge and Bill (David Carradine) – who we see for the first real time here. It’s a great scene, as these two people who clearly love each other, but are no longer together, reminiscence about old times. Tarantino doesn’t portray the massacre itself – he pulls back to show the assassins entering, and the screams, but the event itself isn’t depicted. The final scene – which really goes on for about 30 minutes – is the long conversation, and eventual confrontation between The Bride and Bill that the whole two movies has been building towards. Once again, it is a great sequence – with Thurman at her best, and David Carradine showing perhaps what he could have done had he been given more chances in his career. This really is the film that will be his legacy – one that references his other major role, in Kung Fu (and for 1990s kids like me, Kung Fu: The Legend Continues, which I’m not embarrassed to say, I may have seen every episode of). It plays with that image, but of course makes it darker – showing us what may happen is Kwai Chang Caine went bad. For good measure, Tarantino gives the pair another scene at the halfway point – a flashback sequence, which shows just how in awe The Bride once was of Bill.

 

The rest of the film really is a lot of side roads and diversions from the heart of the film – which is The Bride and Bill. Of course, The Bride still has to deal with Budd (Michael Madsen) and Elle Driver (Darryl Hannah) – the other two assassins who were there that day. Tarantino is clearly a writer who falls in love with his characters, and likes to take time to explore them a little. If O-Ren got that treatment in Volume 1, its Michael Madsen’s Budd who gets it in Volume II. There a brief scene between Budd and Bill, where we find out that they are brothers, before we get a long sequence of Budd, to show how far he has fallen. He lives in a trailer in the desert and now works as a bouncer at a very low rent strip club. The lengthy sequence at that club is almost a sad little movie onto itself – as Madsen is stripped down and humiliated by his boss (played by Larry Gomez), and he just takes it. It’s a great little performance by Madsen. All of this leads to The Bride storming his trailer – and not being prepared for what she finds.

 

We then get another digression – the training sequence of The Bride studying under the great kung fu master Pai Mei (Gordon Liu, playing a different role here than in Volume I). The whole sequence is pure B-movie bliss, with Tarantino indulging himself, allowing himself to do whatever he loved in those old Kung Fu movies. The major fight sequence in the film is between Elle and The Bride – back at Budd’s trailer (poor Budd gets a fittingly pathetic end) – and this is the sequence that Tarantino allows himself to go completely over the top, into an almost goofy fight sequence that makes sense given the Pai Mei sequence.

 

And yet, we’re still not ready to get to Bill. Tarantino allows himself too more diversions – a long conversation between The Bride and Bill’s Mexican father figure (Michael Parks, again, playing a different character than in Volume I), and then a flashback sequence in a hotel room when The Bride out she is pregnant – and convinces a hired killer sent to get rid of her, to her live.

 

In any other hands, Kill Bill Volume II would be dismissed as almost masturbatory self-indulgence by the director. Watching the two films within days of each other, you can easily see how Tarantino could have edits what turns out to be just over four hours of movie, into a leaner, meaner revenge movie about half that length. And yet, with Tarantino, it is that self-indulgence that makes the film work. Tarantino loves the side roads almost more than the main thrust of the plot. He doesn’t want the people the Bride kills to be faceless villains – he wants you to know who they are, before they get offed.

 

In short, Tarantino is always self-indulgent – and even on that level, the two Kill Bill films – Volume II in particular – take it to the extreme. If you hate that kind of storytelling, then the films are probably insufferable – little more than masturbatory fantasies by a middle aged man who needs to grow the hell up. That criticism is fair enough – Tarantino is breaking the rules of cinematic storytelling here, and most of it is indulge himself. However, if you’re on his wavelength, the films are terrific. You have to look no further than the countless directors who have tried to do the same thing that Tarantino has done, and almost all of them have failed. Tarantino is the most self-indulgent filmmaker in the world. And he’s great at it.