Kill Bill? Should be Kill Tarantino, more like...

Rating: 1/10 (30 April 2004)

Awful, boring, slow and tedious are just a few words that spring to mind when I recall having to sit through Kill Bill Vol 2. And those are the kindest words I can think of. A few more choice words would be crap, s***e, rubbish or just plain retarded.
Now, I admit, I wasn't expecting KB Vol 1 rehashed, but I did expect something not too dissimilar from Vol 2. KB2 is to KB1 as The Sound of Music is to The Texas Chainsaw Massacre. The first film's non-stop action has been replaced almost entirely by non-stop dialogue. And not particular good dialogue either. In fact, I'll coin a new term here - dire-logue. The film is littered with it. Any film requires a certain amount of exposition, and even mystic claptrap like that in the Matrix movies. But KB Vol 2 takes claptrap to a new level that makes the Matrix movies look positively Spartan in terms of jibber-jabber. But the worst thing about the chatter in KB2 is the total and utter meaninglessness of most of it. It just drones on and on. A character makes a point verbally then, instead of getting on with the movie, the character is forced to belabour the point over and over until you're practically screaming at them to shut the Hell up and get on with it!
Nor do the pointlessly long (and in fact, just pointless) extra scenes add to the film in any way. For example, we learn that Bud (Bill's brother) lives in a trailer and has a crappy job at a local bar as a bouncer. He's become a loser - a far cry from his assassin days. What I've just summarized in two sentences is dragged out on film over the course of perhaps twenty minutes or more, including an entirely tedious and unnecessary set of scenes involving Bud at work that add absolutely nothing whatsoever to the film and introduce characters that have no bearing on the movie at all. Another scene involves the Bride talking to one of Bill's old colleagues in order to find out where Bill is located. This scene drags on terribly and gives the viewer pointless information on this character which again has precisely no bearing on the movie at all. The only scene which is worthy of inclusion is the obligatory training scene. This is a direct homage to many old Kung Fu movies, right down to the beard stroking sensei. But even this goes on unnecessarily and has you shifting uncomfortably in your seat. And although this scene ties in with the finale and burial scenes, it only serves to remind you that, whilst the Bride was seemingly unable to master punching her fist through a piece of wood, she was apparently highly enough thought of by Pai Mei (the sensei) that he taught her the "hand of death" trick which he had previously never taught to anyone. Hmmm.
The action sequences are brief and entirely unsatisfying for a movie based around the concept of revenge. Bud isn't even slain by the Bride, but by Elle using a Black Mamba (we know it's a Black Mamba because, as Bud is writhing in his death throes on the floor, Elle gives us a tedious five minute exposition on the snake). Elle isn't killed by the Bride, but rather maimed and left after a fight that was very scrappy and not at all elegant. And finally Bill, who is killed by the Bride (after endless boring dialogue about superheroes) in one of the most anticlimactic and disappointing "final encounter" scenes I've ever witnessed.
The truth of this movie is that it's really not a movie at all. It's the extra half-hour that they had to cut from the first film, padded out to two hours or so to make a sequel. With not even particularly brutal editing, KB2 could be distilled down into 30 minutes of relevant, interesting scenes and tacked on to KB1 to make that movie complete. Otherwise this bloated monstrosity is doomed to obscurity in the way that so many sequels so often are - due to over hype and audience expectations being too high.
Quentin Tarantino is to be commended for his movie efforts on the most part. However, KB2 is little more than self-indulgent twaddle wrapped up as a film and served up for consumption on the strength of its predecessor. It's destined to become one of those "I liked so-and-so, but the sequel was rubbish" type of deals. This is even more certain in the light of certain comments I read by Tarantino where he made a big deal of telling everyone that he was sparing no effort in the editing room. If this film is an example of his editing skills, I'd say he needs to be evicted from post-production facilities and the door locked securely behind him to ensure he can't get back in.