wet dream

Rating: 4/10 (20 December 2005)

this movie is a sort of adolescent wet dream... ninja woman who acts like a cool man and looks good in a tight suit kills people with a samurai sword...
this movie has pitifully little dialogue, and it doesn't have that usual Tarantino snap... what had a delicious pulpy quality in earlier offerings, now comes off as shallow...
i suppose we should praise QT for making something a little different to his usual stuff, but frankly, this movie is coma inducing (and it's not really that far out from his previous work)... the chapters between the fight scenes seem like a glass of warm, flat beer... and QT has served up some crisp refreshing ale before, so it's even more disappointing... after the millionth decapitation, mutilation, spray of blood etc (the gore is not shocking, it's so cartoony that you can't really feel anything) you just think: "this movie doesn't hold together and it's boring"...
i'll give a few points for the odd spectacular fight scene shot... but frankly it's not a visceral experience, it's not clever, and i left my teens behind six years ago...
a cheap kung fu movie with expensive production values... and that ruins whatever magic those types of movies have... oh and the anime stuff in the middle just feels out of place and forced...