Xixax Film Forum

The Director's Chair => Quentin Tarantino => Topic started by: Weak2ndAct on September 25, 2003, 05:10:05 PM

Title: 1st Kill Bill 'review'?
Post by: Weak2ndAct on September 25, 2003, 05:10:05 PM
This was linked to from the Drudge Report.  An out-and-out rave.  Goddamnit, I want to see this movie NOW!

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,98244,00.html
Title: 1st Kill Bill 'review'?
Post by: edison on September 26, 2003, 10:42:27 AM
There have been many reviews at aint-it-cool for quite some time now.
Title: 1st Kill Bill 'review'?
Post by: picolas on September 26, 2003, 11:40:20 AM
nobody read my pooooooooost..what up, nobody? nothing? oh..okay..
Title: 1st Kill Bill 'review'?
Post by: Weak2ndAct on September 26, 2003, 01:49:59 PM
Don't read the fan-boy comments on AICN, I'm a little tired of 'reviews' that read "I so jizzed in my pants," or "that chick from Battle Royale was so freakin' hot!"  One of the first real press screenings was Wednesday night here in LA, and this was the first press article to be written.  The Variety review's a rave too (dunno if that's online yet, but it is very good).
Title: 1st Kill Bill 'review'?
Post by: Ghostboy on September 26, 2003, 02:04:14 PM
Technically, one of the first reviews would be from Pete over in the other Kill Bill thread. Allow me to provide the second (for this site, at least).

This movie is incredible. I read the 1st draft of the script last year and thought, "if he pulls this off, this will be something absolutely new and amazing, but can he actually pull it off?" He sure can. This is unmistakably a Tarantino film...it's like the culimination of everything he's hinted at before. I really wish there had just been a five minute intermission between parts one and two, because I couldn't get enough of this.

A few other thoughts:

This is the goriest movie I've ever seen. KNB have truly been unleashed. If it wasn't for a strategic switch to b/w at a key point (detailed in the script, so don't blame the MPAA), this would get an NC-17. As it is, I'm surprised some of these things got past the censors. Jaw droppingly violent. Lucy Liu's comments a few months back were very appropraite.

The animation is stunning (and also NC-17 worthy).

The stuff that comes before the opening titles is a brilliant touch.

The RZA rules, and if you can leave this movie and not go buy the soundtrack, well...you've got more will power than me.

The Gold Trumpet was worried that this would be all action, but I don't think he has any idea what he's worried about. The action is just...shit. The whole movie is so hard to describe. It's just an amalgamation of everything you could possibly imagine Tarantino putting in a movie.

I love it. Can't wait until the tenth (and the 20th).
Title: 1st Kill Bill 'review'?
Post by: MacGuffin on September 26, 2003, 02:10:29 PM
Do you feel it was right to break it into two parts?
Title: 1st Kill Bill 'review'?
Post by: Ghostboy on September 26, 2003, 02:16:51 PM
Now that I've seen it, it makes perfect sense. Still, I'd rather be able to judge it as one big movie and not have to wait four months for the second half. I think an intermission would have been appropriate. But it ends on a perfect cliffhanger note...so I don't think people will be walking away unsatisfied at all.
Title: 1st Kill Bill 'review'?
Post by: Redlum on September 26, 2003, 02:47:44 PM
I read in Empire that in Eastern cinemas the switch to b/w will not occur. True?
Title: 1st Kill Bill 'review'?
Post by: Gold Trumpet on September 26, 2003, 02:57:50 PM
OK, Ghostboy, you trumped my fear of all out action in the ordinary sense, but do you still think I'll like the movie?

~rougerum
Title: 1st Kill Bill 'review'?
Post by: mutinyco on September 26, 2003, 03:37:53 PM
GT, you don't like anything!... Wait...neither do I...
Title: 1st Kill Bill 'review'?
Post by: SoNowThen on September 26, 2003, 03:42:15 PM
Hehehe
Title: 1st Kill Bill 'review'?
Post by: Ghostboy on September 26, 2003, 06:16:34 PM
GT, I honestly can't tell whether or not you'll like it. I think, though, that if you go in expecting just straight action movie, you'll be surprised...whether or not its a pleasant surprise, we'll have to see.

I sure hope you like it.
Title: 1st Kill Bill 'review'?
Post by: Pozer on September 26, 2003, 08:04:29 PM
Mother Freaking Awesome!!

I'm gonna love this even more than I anticipated, I know it.

this is where I come for my reviews and I definately have the same tastes as GB, so now I'm super excited.

"I so jizzed in my pants!"
Title: 1st Kill Bill 'review'?
Post by: Alethia on September 26, 2003, 09:56:43 PM
at the end of volume 1, does it say like 'to be continued' or something?  or does it just end as if there was to be no part two?
Title: 1st Kill Bill 'review'?
Post by: edison on September 27, 2003, 12:03:57 AM
Quote from: ewardat the end of volume 1, does it say like 'to be continued' or something?  or does it just end as if there was to be no part two?

Why dont you just wait until the 10th and be surprised?
Title: 1st Kill Bill 'review'?
Post by: lamas on September 27, 2003, 01:12:43 AM
am I the only one who thinks the trailer makes this movie look bad?  when I read the rough draft of the screenplay I thought it was straddling the line between something cool like some of his previous work or just plain corny a la Charlie's Angels.  if the trailer is any indication, this movie falls on the corny side.  if it's true that vol. 2 slows things down and brings the Bill character to the forefront that sounds like it'll be the better movie.
Title: 1st Kill Bill 'review'?
Post by: brockly on September 27, 2003, 07:08:56 AM
"It's "Crouching Tiger" and "The Matrix," mixed together and served with hot sauce. What a meal these three films will make some day at a revival house!"

That was uncalled for!!!
Title: 1st Kill Bill 'review'?
Post by: Cecil on September 27, 2003, 10:49:03 AM
ive said it before: those who say that kill bill looks like a charlies angels rip off dont get asian cinema.
Title: 1st Kill Bill 'review'?
Post by: Ghostboy on September 27, 2003, 01:39:57 PM
I'd agree that the new trailer does sort of play up the goofy factor. But I was surprised at how serious the movie was.
Title: 1st Kill Bill 'review'?
Post by: Alethia on September 27, 2003, 02:28:56 PM
when are we gonna see your review, ghostboy?
Title: 1st Kill Bill 'review'?
Post by: MacGuffin on September 27, 2003, 02:38:50 PM
Quote from: ewardwhen are we gonna see your review, ghostboy?

It's on page 1.
Title: 1st Kill Bill 'review'?
Post by: finlayr on September 27, 2003, 10:35:26 PM
Ghostboy:  I'm just wondering how you go to see Volume 1?

And..eh...I'm jealous to say the least...
Title: 1st Kill Bill 'review'?
Post by: lamas on September 28, 2003, 12:58:11 AM
there you go Cecil, Ghostboy agreed that the trailer plays up the goofiness.  if the movie is more serious than the trailer lets on then it'll be a relief.  i'd like to think i "get" all kinds of asian cinema.  i'm a big fan of alot of the old shaw brothers flicks like master killer and 8 diagram pole fighter but if you think this trailer makes kill bill look anything like those classics then you're crazy.  it definitely makes the movie out to be a quick-cut MTV McG style cornball fest.  i really hope i'm wrong.  when i hear that the violence is just so brutal and could've earned an NC17 rating, that brings me hope.
Title: 1st Kill Bill 'review'?
Post by: Cecil on September 28, 2003, 01:15:38 AM
meh
Title: 1st Kill Bill 'review'?
Post by: finlayr on September 28, 2003, 06:31:00 PM
I heard Tarantino has a pet sheep that he keeps here in Ireland and when he's over here he walks it in a big field whilst stroking his genius chin.  Is this true, does anyone know?
Title: 1st Kill Bill 'review'?
Post by: modage on September 28, 2003, 07:43:38 PM
mixed review up at the hollywood reporter...

Kill Bill -- Vol. 1
By Kirk Honeycutt

Blood is the dominant leitmotif of Quentin Tarantino's "Kill Bill -- Vol. 1." It oozes, drips, flows, gushes, splatters and geysers in lush crimson to oily black. Scalps, limbs and heads are freely removed from characters' bodies. Since the movie essentially takes place in an Asian action-movie world, we're not to take offense at this torrent of blood and dismembered bodies. In each "chapter," art design, costumes and music are lovingly crafted to pay to homage various "grindhouse" B-movie genres. There is an aesthetic -- a movie-geek obeisance, if you will -- behind every moment of violence. Nevertheless, "Kill Bill" may be a case of overkill.

So where does this leave admirers of Tarantino's previous takes on pulp cinema? Dare we say wait until February? "Kill Bill," of course, is a three-hour-plus movie, which the writer-director and Miramax decided to release in two parts (or "Volumes"). "Vol. 2" opens Feb. 20. This may represent clever marketing as "Vol. 1" is one of the year's most eagerly anticipated films, certain to enjoy major boxoffice response. But how does one review a film at Intermission?

The movie feels incomplete, even though Tarantino has crafted an OK three-act structure with a climatic 20-minute samurai sword battle that will have an audience pining not for more but actually welcoming a four-month break. (Is that good?) Yet, one suspects that halving a movie meant to be seen in a single sitting has upset its stylistic balance. When the two volumes get joined in a DVD version, we may detect a strategy not immediately apparent in "Vol. 1."

The Bride, aka Black Mamba (Uma Thurman), awakens from a four-year coma, following the massacre in a lonely Texas outpost, with a metal plate in her head and vengeance in her heart. Only part of her back story becomes clear in "Vol. 1." She formerly belonged to an elite squad of assassins, each one code-named for a deadly snake.

The team leader is Bill -- barely seen in "Vol. 1" and played by "Kung Fu's" David Carradine -- who is the father of her unborn child at the time he shoots her. The first movie details her lethal elimination of Vernita Green, aka Copperhead (Vivica A. Fox), hiding from her past as a Pasadena housewife, and O-Ren Ishii (Lucy Liu), the Chinese-Japanese-American head of the Tokyo underworld. Ahead lies the (presumed) demise of Elle Driver/California Mountain Snake (Daryl Hannah), Budd/Sidewinder (Michael Madsen) and, of course, Bill.

Thurman is quite wonderful, if one wants a humorless, strong-willed gymnast for a heroine. For that matter, Tarantino insists that his actors strip all emotions from their playbooks. A child watches her mother die without a change in expression. A sheriff (Michael Parks) regards a pile of bodies with professional detachment. A gang leader watches her gang get wiped out with complete serenity.

Emotions aren't all that's missing in "Kill Bill," at least at Intermission. Unlike Tarantino's postmodern classic "Pulp Fiction," this movie lacks humor, subtext, unpredictability and the rich dialogue that made that film so memorable. Instead of rethinking genre movies, here he is a slave to them.

Make no mistake: The film is hugely watchable. Robert Richardson's cinematography, both in color and black and white, is fluid, brilliantly lit and dazzling to behold. Sally Menke's editing moves us swiftly through the chapters, while costumes and sets are eye-catching delights. A terrific anime sequence makes a striking and original way to give us O-Ren Ishii's back story. And the fight choreography is jaw-droppingly kinetic.

Is "Kill Bill" a homage to great Asian action movies? Yes. Is Tarantino trying to outdo his cherished masters (on a budget that dwarfs their films)? Of course. Is there any other point of any of this? Let's see "Vol. 2."