Better than the Original in every way

Rating: 10/10 (18 December 2004)

"That woman deserves her revenge. And we all deserves to die. But then again, so does she."
There is nothing more satisfying than feeling so much hatred for a character, and believing that there is nothing in this world that can make you feel sorry for him, only to have the director/writer change your mind at the very end. We don't know much about Bill from the first Kill Bill. All we know is that he is evil to the eyes of the world and to the eyes of his own Master. He wronged our heroine, and we wanted to see him die. He must not suffer to faith of a normal death too. We want to see him die by the hand of gorgeous and extremely talented Uma Thurman. And then... suddenly... we don't want to. Because Bill never deserve to die. The Bride does.
This is classic he said she said story. I felt like when I was listening to my friend talking about how bad some guy treated her, only to find out later that the truth is often different.
I know Tarentino has always been capable of deep and symbolic storyline. But I never thought he would put those type of stories into Kill Bill. Considering all the other over-the-top subplot. The main plot is consist of simple domestic misunderstanding and over-reaction that put the bloodbath into motion. What a great writing. And that is all Kill Bill Vol. 2 is. Great story. Volume one was all about action without a doubt. The fight scenes in part 2 doesn't top the first one (though there are several good ones still). There are a lot more talk, and even though problem are still being solve by force, there are much more understanding of the situation and critical thinking. More than a pointless (but cool) conversation that just simply link one scene to another.
Big Spoiler (because I want to discuss the ending)
The Bride deserve to die. But the fact that the baby was his, Bill changed his mind about killing her. And this whole thing happened because Bill allow it to happen out of guilt. If he had kill her, this whole thing would have been over with long ago. Bill did nothing wrong. Even the Bride knew she was wrong because she said at the end (though she was talking about something else, we all knew what she meant) that she is a bad person. Again, to invent a morally satisfying conclusion for a story of revenge is something that is so hard and, if pulled of successfully, is something that is very ingenious.
Earlier this year Tarentino sponsored the release of Hero, another movie that is revenge driven, but something that happened stop our heroes in their track. I saw that movie before Volume 2 was release and I thought to myself that if Tarentino like Hero, then there's no way Kill Bill would end with just simply Bill dying and Bride walk into the sunset.
This movie also raise a question as to why the Bride chose her daughter over Bill. They were both killers. She was just as dangerous to her baby as Bill would have been. They were living together as husband and wife. And he never harmed her. Why did she think she have the right to run away with his child? Because it is inside her? In our society, when men do not pay child support and/or simply abandon the child, we frown upon their act. Because the mother is the one stuck with the baby while the father can just run off. But in reverse situation, the mother cannot decide she's just going to push the father out of the picture.
And at the dinner table in the final battle scene, The Bride knew that she was wrong. And she killed all those people not because they are evil, but because they punished her. They punished her for her sin that she did not want to acknowledge. And she felt good. At that point, Bill and Bride cannot live as husband and wife. One of them has to die. Bill chose for her to live on. At the very end Bill said "No you are not, You are a wonderful person." Not because she did the right thing. But because he loves her. And the Bride said Thank You for giving her a second chance.
I gave Kill Bill vol. 1 10/10 because I thought it was a celebration of movie by experimenting different type of styles (from cartoon to black and white) with no care for realism. Combine with one cool scene after another, that movie was an instant classic. But I regret giving it that perfect score, not because it wasn't as good as I thought it was. It's just that volume 2 is so much better and I want to give it a higher score than the first one. I'm not one of those people who gives 11, so I guess I'll just have to settle for 10/10. But this movie reached the level of quality far beyond my expectation. Even if you hate the first one. You gotta see this movie.
Panasit