Unbelievable, but Tarantino has done it again! He did because he can do it like no one else, coming up with yet another 100% blockbuster that even the most exacting cinephiles can find no faults with.
In other words, he did something believed next to impossible in the dream merchants’ world. Pulp Fiction’s runaway success proved a heavy burden, along with Jackie Brown’s relatively mediocre ratings, facing Tarantino with a tough dilemma: repeating himself or making an unconventional move. He chose the latter and won thanks to two qualities of his: familiarity with absolutely everything made or being produced in the world of the cinema (e.g., elite) and an infallible sense of conjuncture (e.g., the masses). In other words, remaining true to his film director’s quoting, postmodernist method, he changed the quoting basis. While Pulp Fiction was obviously a sign of appreciation of the French nouvelle vague (new wave) and its genius Jean-Luc Godard, the new production points to polarized creative authorities, people Tarantino has respected for a long time. Namely, the Show Brothers in Hong Kong.
Show Brothers (or Showscope, regrettably no longer in existence) was the best-known Hong Kong moviemaking manager, producing dozens of pictures of all genres, ranging from musicals to dramas to costume to action movies (like Jackie Chan). Transferring the Hollywood format to the Far East’s expanses yielded a remarkable result. The Show Brothers’ style was marked by bright filtered colors and stunningly naпve directing and script approaches, overdramatized cast technique, and boiling passions in almost every production. Tarantino added to this assortment his own cynical humor, taking the rest to a virtuoso summit verging on the absurd. In addition, he pulled an excellent strategic stunt, a spatial inversion, flying to Hong Kong and making an action movie in keeping with every local sword-clanging rule. In other words, he returned the energy its original source.
The effect was explosive.
Asian art-house and commercial moviemaking ratings have been on a steady upward curve over the past couple of years. By and large, Tarantino has discovered nothing essentially new, except that he timely and very accurately implemented a trend that will become dominant one or two years from now. The same was the case with Pulp Fiction which had opened the floodgate letting in a powerful stream of cynical and hedonistic gang war movies; the same is likely to happen to Kill Bill, as the West constantly acknowledges the Oriental moviemaking brothers’ talent (giving them prizes and money).
Tarantino makes everything start happening in the very first scene. After the flowery Show logo, verging on kitsch, he scatters the blinding yellow-red- crimson patterns all over the film; we see them in the groats scattered on the floor of the kitchen after the first (rather, the second) victim is murdered, in the canary costume of the ruthless heroine played by Uma Thurman; in the yellow-crimson apparel she wears when escaping from the hospital; in the dйcor of the Yakuza club, the scene of the main battle. Incidentally, this particular scene with its refined effects is like a concise encyclopedia on cinematography. The rock group made up of girls sporting miniskirts and funny tall hairdos dating from the 1970s, blasting away with a rock’n’roll number, is a direct reference to the Show Brothers’ musicals. The sudden blackout, Thurman flying in a black-and-white haze to an appropriate musical accompaniment, instantly remind one of Japanese samurai movies of 1930- 50. Finally, her duel with the Yakuza lady boss in a stunningly beautiful winter garden is a Show-Oshima-Kitano combination.
Of course, there is more to the film than the Show Brothers and Asia. I don’t know if Tarantino watched the latest film festival sensations — Lars von Trier’s Dogville or Pedro Almavir’s Talk to Her — but there are certain aspects indicating that he did. The carefully planned interiors shot from above and the division into chapters (along with the ruthless blonde in the lead role) echo of Trier. Almadovar’s presence is even more tangible; the sentimental Spanish director’s hospital orderly falls in love with a beautiful comatose woman and Tarantino’s orderly sells his unconscious female patient to whoever is prepared to pay. Evil, very evil, and the outcome is different, as Thurman ruthlessly kills both the client and the orderly, something Almadovar’s prim young ladies would never dream of.
It would be a mistake, however, to regard Kill Bill as a mere collection of visual quotes. All reminiscences of others’ styles and productions, in addition to reflections, are used to serve the main purpose of keeping the audience in gripping suspense, from the first to the last scene. Paraphrasing the film’s epigraph, it is about revenge, a dish best prepared in cold blood. Tarantino put together his deadly plot in a coldly calculating manner. As always, every scene has a perfectly timed rhythm and fitting music (he says that’s how to make a good movie). In this sense, Thurman onboard a jet over Tokyo, to the accompaniment of a stylized Flight of the Bumblebee, with her future adversary, the Yakuza queen racing below in a limo, escorted by Black killer bikers, is worth being included in all moviemaking annals. This combination of video and soundtrack can only be described as perfect. Later, the battle scene at the Yakuza club, when the black thugs first attack Thurman like a swarm of killer ants, and then crawl back, defeated, looks quite logical.
While building an ideal action movie, Tarantino allowed himself to ignore even the script as such. The plot is roughhewn, with little regard to sequences or sudden bends. A woman warrior, outraged and humiliated, metes out her justice. What more do you want? It’s a trap the audiences falls into head first. And this is only the first episode. The second one is nearing completion and one can be sure that Tarantino will have something up his sleeve, as usual. Since this is not the end of the story, this review is likewise left unfinished.
One thing is certain. Kill Bill has turned out to be a genuine blockbuster.
