Not as good as Vol. 1...

Rating: 6/10 (2 July 2007)

Kill Bill: Vol. 2 starts as vengeful assassin Beatrix Kiddo (Uma Thurman) head towards El Passo & Bill's brother Budd (Michael Madsen) to continue her roaring rampage of revenge. Things don't go her way though & she ends up buried alive, can she escape & finally get her long awaited revenge on her ex-boss Bill (David Carradine) who left her & her baby for dead?
Written & directed by Quentin Tarantino I'll say it straight away, Kill Bill: Vol. 2 is nowhere near as good as Kill Bill: Vol. 1 (2003) in my opinion. There, I said it & I firmly believe it to be the truth. In Kill Bill: Vol. 1 there was a definite energy, a zip, a breakneck pace that lead from one over-the-top set-piece to another. It had buckets of violence & blood while still maintaining that cool Tarantino vibe that was present in both Reservoir Dogs (1992) & Pulp Fiction (1994) which made them both iconic hits of the 90's. Here in Kill Bill: Vol. 2 the pace is sedate, the self consciously cool small talk dialogue just isn't as effective here with noting particularly exciting happening around it. Kill Bill: Vol. 2 just ends up feeling like a hollow mess with lots of irreverent dialogue which tries to be cool, I'm sorry but for me it didn't work & I frankly missed the violence, the gore & the character's of Kill Bill: Vol. 1 which I think I'm going to watch again to get the memory of Kill Bill: Vol. 2 out of my mind. There are still some nice scenes here & some mildly amusing dialogue along the way but as a whole I don't think it has what made Kill Bill: Vol. 1 so special, above average but below the standard I expected & hoped for.
Director Tarantino knows how to turn in a stylish action flick, it's just a shame the action doesn't really start until an hour in. Since Tarantino is a bit of a fan-boy when it comes to martial arts & cult flicks in general there are loads of references to other films which you may or may no notice although I thought it was nice that the film mentions Shogun Assassin (1980) by name as the similarities are obvious & for those of you who don't know Shogun Assassin is a real film & it's an absolutely terrific film at that. Rumour has it Tarantino has a thing for feet & you can tell here because there are a lot of scenes involving people's feet including another scene of Thurman stepping on & crushing someones plucked out eyeball, foot fetishists will enjoy this. I didn't think all of the visual tricks worked in this & preferred the comic book feel of the original. The violence here is much tamer than Kill Bill: Vol. 1, Vol 1 had over forty on screen death's while Vol. 2 has a paltry three of which Thurman only kills one, Elle (Daryl Hannah) kills Budd & Pai Mei (Chia Hui Liu) with Thurman killing Bill at the end. I know violence & action don't necessarily make a great film they sure as hell help!
With a supposed budget of about $30,000,000 Kill Bill: Vol. 2 is very well made with top notch production values, it definitely has that expensive Hollywood look to it, excellent cinematography & choreography. The acting is pretty good, Thurman makes for a sexy anti-hero & Carradine is a cool bad guy. Samuel L. Jackson gets about 30 seconds of screen time.
Kill Bill: Vol. 2 is a definite disappointment after the excellent violent & bloody excess of Kill Bill: Vol. 1, at over two hours it's too long & is a drawn out way to round the story off. Did this really get a 5 minute standing ovation from the audience it was premiered too? If it did why? If you have seen both Kill Bill films & want to watch one again watch the original.