excellent

Rating: 10/10 (4 February 2007)

Of the original "Kill Bill," I wrote: "The movie is all storytelling and no story. The motivations have no psychological depth or resonance, but are simply plot markers. The characters consist of their characteristics." True, but one of the achievements of "Vol. 2" is that the story is filled in, the characters are developed, and they do begin to resonate, especially during the extraordinary final meeting between The Bride and Bill  which consists not of nonstop action but of more hypnotic dialogue and ends in an event that is like a quiet, deadly punch line.
Put the two parts together, and Tarantino has made a masterful saga that celebrates the martial arts genre while kidding it, loving it, and transcending it. I confess I feared that "Vol. 2" would be like those sequels that lack the intensity of the original.