not a pretty picture...

Rating: Null/10 (3 December 2004)

Fairly often, I find myself pressured to justify my dislike of Quentin Tarantino movies. I've taken to saying that I simply don't care about stories that involve "killers killing killers." That's Tarantino's obsession - gangsters vs. vampires, hit men vs. other hit men, and here, a vengeful ex-assassin vs. her entire old gang. Every character involved is - forgive the George W. Bushism - "evil," and so I have no one to latch on to, no one to root for. Uma Thurman's Bride is really only *slightly* less repulsive than her opponents. And actually, since David Carradine is a better actor than Thurman, I'm tempted to root for Bill!
I'm glad that Tarantino has found an outlet for his...ah..."vision" in movies, because I shudder to think what else he could be doing right now. I can admire his stuff only to a point, because it carries such a deeply disturbing (and disturbed) taint. The animated segment of "Kill Bill" comes across as particularly gratuitous, and seems to serve no real purpose except to build up a villain who amounts to nothing much.
I've noticed that, over the past few years, certain film-makers and writers seem determined to "elevate" the childish genres they loved in their youths to new levels of sophistication: sci-fi, horror, super hero comics, fantasy, and now martial arts movies. So we get "Lord of the Rings" adaptations that cost eight gazillion dollars, great directors like Ang Lee and Bryan Singer devoting their talents to silly popcorn flicks, and here, an arty-farty version of all those grainy-looking Hong Kong action yarns that are available on $5 DVDs. You know what? Sometimes schlock is just schlock; I didn't really need to see a "literate" kung fu potboiler. Good photography can only elevate poor material so far.
In fairness, I saw the closing scenes of "Kill Bill, Vol. II," and thought they were great. But they contained little violence and were clearly more original than anything seen in Volume I. Perhaps there is one good movie waiting to be discovered in the midst of two mediocre ones...