Dir. Quentin Tarantino, 2004, USA, 136 mins
Cast: Uma Therman, David Carradine, Michael Madsen, Darryl Hannah, Gordon Liu
Now, where we were we? Ah yes. The Bride (Uma Thurman) a.k.a. Black Mamba, had woken from a four year coma following her wedding day massacre, hell bent on a trail of revenge that had already seen her depose of two of the perpetrators. As volume 2 opens, she sets off to find the remaining two members of the Deadly Assassin Viper Squad and, ultimately, to "Kill Bill".
The first point to notice is that this is a long film, just twenty minutes short of three hours, and with it there is a change of tone, quite melodic and pensive, with emphasis on the characters rather than the violence itself. Not to worry though, there's still plenty of that!
The opening chapter, shot in moody black and white, is of the wedding day massacre. Not a wedding in fact, but a rehearsal, at which there is an unexpected guest: Bill (David Carradine). His reunion with his former lover is poignant and prompts us to understand why Carradine himself describes Kill Bill as a love story. However, the atmosphere is electric as the audience, despite the touching dialogue, the haunting music, and the ethereal glow around the characters, prepares itself for the inevitable bloodbath. There's a good cameo for Samuel L. Jackson here too, having apparently demanded that Tarantino write a part into the script for him.
Knowing that the Bride is on the rampage, he warns his no-good brother Budd (Michael Madsen). The tattooed, trailer trash, out-of-work cleaner waxes philosophical: "That woman deserves her revenge, and we deserve to die. But then she also deserves to die", and a very good attempt he makes too. In possibly the most flawed moment in the two films, Budd does indeed almost succeed in putting an end to the crack, almost unstoppable, trained assassin. However, it does allow for the most intense and disturbing scene in the film, in which the Bride is forced to claw her way out of a buried coffin. Tarantino keeps the screen black for long moments, with only the sounds of her panic and gasps for breath. This is real horror, very claustrophobic, and plays perfectly with our innate fears of being buried alive.
However, someone else is on the trail of the Bride, the evil, one-eyed Elle Driver (Daryl Hannah), a woman who will stop at nothing - including Budd - to get what she wants. Hannah is remarkably adept at portraying the cold-blooded killer, demonstrating a flair as a flashing, hypnotic femme fatale and, in the showdown with the Bride, proves a fitting adversary.
But the final scenes are what make this a great movie, the Bride's homecoming. As she resolves to finally kill Bill, she is met with the sight of the man playing on his porch with their young daughter and is completely disarmed. This gentle interlude is a most satisfying denouement, as the family is reunited. David Carradine is both engaging and charismatic in the title role, and the interplay between him and the Bride - whose name we finally discover - is so beautifully played out that we are left in do doubt as to this being a perfectly matched couple. As Carradine points out, there are no good guys in a Tarantino movie, and that includes the Bride. He understands this woman completely and forces her to confront what she is - a killer who enjoys the kill. One almost expects them to kiss and make up - almost.
Kill Bill 2 is a hugely satisfying film, providing us with answers and more. More akin with his earlier, dialogue-led movies in which the action supplements the story, nevertheless Tarantino has once again assimilated a variety of movie genres and re-presented them to us in his own loving, unique manner. The flashback scene in particular, where the Bride learns her skills at the hands of the martial arts master, Pei Mai (Gordon Liu, a veteran of Shaolin-style kung fu movies) is yet another immaculate redefinition of the genre that Tarantino is both master and fan of.
Tarantino has said that he would like to do a Kill Bill 3, possibly in 2019. Time to allow both the Bride's and Vernita Green's daughters to grow up and take up their destinies? It may well be that Kill Bill becomes his Apocalypse Now, an obsession that will never be fully completed. However, on the evidence of volumes 1 and 2, this may not be a bad thing. In any case, the halves of the whole have given film a new style of epic that proves that films can be action packed, profound, beautifully made and lots of fun, all at the same time.
Jean Lynch
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