"KEEP BUSTIN'."

Kill Bill: Vol. 2

(another unused one for the ain’t it cool news.)

Harry and associates,

I am writing to inform you of an exciting new picture called KILL BILL VOLUME 2. Please forgive me if you already know about this one or have covered it already. Or if you have travelled to China to visit the set. I don’t usually read your sight except when my reviews are on it.

Just jerkin your chain bud but seriously here’s the deal. This has been coming on for a while but after seeing this movie I think today is the day. I would like to officially endorse the works of Mr. Tarantino as an important chapter in the history of Badass Cinema. VOLUME 2 is a very satisfying conclusion to that exciting saga of revenge we began oh those several months ago with The Bride.

Kill Bill: Vol. 2VOLUME 2 is really different from VOLUME 1 though. It seemed like that one was more about fighting than talking, and this one is the other way around. In fact there’s so much sitting around talking in the opening scenes that it looks like they had to move the opening credits to the end, afraid that people would be bored by endless driving followed by endless talking. But this one goes much deeper into the characters, revealing all the goods about the relationship between the Bride and Bill (who, remember, you didn’t even get to SEE in the first one – now he’s all over the place). The Bride becomes a little deeper of a character and you even get to feel some amount of sympathy for Bill. It’s a much sweeter film.

But it’s still totally brutal. One thing I loved in VOLUME 1 was the scene where the Bride woke up from her coma, realized her baby was gone, and just started to bawl. The audience is having a great time and then Tarantino intentionally bums them out and makes them watch Ms. Thurman’s extended, uncomfortably realistic trauma. I can’t think of another movie that plays so well with a combination of goofy kung fu type fun and raw emotion. Tarantino and the audience have so much fun with the violence and then every once in a while he just slaps you upside the head with the real life consequences of it, like the scene with Vernita Green’s daughter. I mean shit I love the CHARLIES ANGELS pictures but this is like the “deep” version of that. On crack. Times ten. From beyond the grave.

Well, VOLUME 2 is like the sequel to that crying scene. There were times when I thought jesus Tarantino, do you really have to put this poor gal through even more horror? How many times can we see her face bloodied or her eyes red from crying? Can’t she kick an ass or two first before she gets shotgunned, drugged and buried alive? But once again Mr. Tarantino proves that he knows what he’s doing, just you wait. To me the most satisfying moment in the movie – and for christ’s sake don’t be reading this shit if you don’t want it given away – is after she’s been buried alive and it moves on to the next chapter, “The Cruel Tutelage of Pai Mei.” We leave the Bride gasping for air six feet deep and flash back to her as a young gal wearing Keds being dumped with a bearded old school kung fu mentor for years of horrible training. I thought all right, this is a cliffhanger, we’re gonna have to wait to find out how the hell she survives that. And then you kind of forget about the grave until it comes back to it and you realize exactly how she’s gonna escape, and you have no choice but to smile like a retard. Absolutely perfect Badass filmatism.

If you are not familiar with volume 1, what this story is about is a badass killer who is ruthlessly shot on her wedding day, along with her unborn child. She is in a coma for 4 years, then boldly overcomes her atrophied muscles to escape the hospital, goes off to train with swords and then goes down the list of the people who shot her and avenges them one by one.

I know what you’re thinking. What do you mean ‘HER’? The character of Mason Storm is clearly a MAN, played by Steven Seagal, and he was in a coma for 7 years, not 4. And his child who was supposedly dead but is not actually dead was already born. Actually, you’re thinking of HARD TO KILL, another fine film on this same topic of coma revenge. (Where’s that dude who did “WHO DO YOU THINK YOU’RE FOOLING?” when you need him?)

Anyway, there is a classic fight scene or two (on a much more intimate scale than the House of Blues scene in volume 1) but most of this movie seems to be going for the spaghetti western type feel. Lots of wide shots, extreme closeups of faces and dusty settings. The music is less upbeat, mostly bits of Ennio Morricone scores or more often Robert Rodriguez imitating Ennio Morricone scores. If you loved the RZA’s score for GHOST DOG as much as I did I am sorry to report that once again it is unclear how he got the composer credit. Except I did notice one great scene with what sounded like RZA beats, and there is an instrumental on the end credits.

The whole cast is great and as always Tarantino is a master at finding actors you either haven’t seen before or don’t remember when you’ve seen them, that just seem like the perfect guy for that scene. I was most impressed by the dude who played Michael Madsen (FREE WILLY)’s boss at the strip club. Where does he find these guys?

(Hey, wasn’t the dude from SPAWN supposed to be in this movie? Where’d he go?)

But the most important part of the picture is of course Uma Thurman. I really don’t think anybody else could’ve done this movie. She’s just a once in a lifetime combination of surface and substance. Obviously she is gorgeous and her long limbs help her look great in all the physical stuff she pulls off so perfectly – the tiger crane kung fu, the menacing strut, the zombie-like stumbling around covered in dirt and blood. But then she also has to do all the “real acting” shit. It’s a classic character and performance. If she can get an oscar nomination for PULP FICTION and not for this then I guess there must’ve raised the bar or something.

But like I said before, I am happy to welcome Mr. Tarantino into the pantheon. I don’t care if the guy yammers on too long in his interviews or whatever it is people don’t like about him. I don’t care if you used to like him but then everybody else liked him so then you decided you didn’t like him and took his pinup out of your locker. Kids, all that shit is only relevant in the talkbacks. In the actual world of Badass Cinema what matters is what’s projected up on the screen there. It’s not his encyclopedic knowledge of crime/action/kung fu/western etc. that makes him great (thanks for the homage to MR. MAJESTYK though, that was nice). Behind all that is an extreme confidence that he can take the audience wherever the fuck he wants to, and the skills to back that up.

When I reviewed Mr. Kubrick’s 2001 recently I tried to describe that feeling you rarely get in movies where you feel you are in the hands of a true master who ignores all Hollywood formula and common sense, and just KNOWS he can take you in one cut from primitive ape men playing with bones to a space station thousands of years later. No, I’m not saying Tarantino is the new Kubrick, but he gives me that same great feeling. He KNOWS he can skip around in the timeline at his leisure, and you will follow. He KNOWS he can balance gruesome violence, goofy humor, campy ’70s homage and the serious story of losing a child. That he can put the crying scene in the same movie with O Ren decapitating the yakuza boss for laughs. I appreciate that this guy takes his time to get things right, instead of making a movie every year just to be working.

I gotta say it friends. He is one of the great living filmatists. For sure. You don’t make RESERVOIR DOGS, PULP FICTION, JACKIE BROWN and now this unless you know what the fuck you’re doing. He is one of the few (besides occasionally Mr. Soderbergh) treating crime, martial arts and action pictures as both crowdpleasing fun and serious Art with a capital A. I mean even in the ’70s you didn’t see that all the time, although obviously alot of Peckinpah’s movies qualify, and of course POINT BLANK.

Oh jesus can you imagine if he had done a movie with Lee Marvin? Or Charles Bronson or Steve McQueen? Holy shit.

Anyway I approve of this guy and I can’t wait to go see this movie again.

thanks Harry,

Vern

This entry was posted on Friday, April 16th, 2004 at 10:38 pm and is filed under Action, Reviews, Thriller. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.

62 Responses to “Kill Bill: Vol. 2”

  1. Holy shit! Was that the guy from SPAWN in the deleted scene from the special features on the DVD?!!! I rented both volumes this weekend and watched them back-to-back and when I checked out that deleted scene where Bill fights the street gang, I thought I recognized the guy playing the lead…but I couldn’t find a credit with this name!!!

  2. It’s been a long time since anyone called Michael Jai White “the guy from SPAWN” around these parts.

  3. But yes, that’s Michael Jai Black Dynamite Undisputed II Blood and Bone Exit Wounds The Guy From Spawn White. And his love of martial arts movies comes through in the way he mimics a typical New Zealand dubbed accent. Even though I didn’t know quite how awesome he was back then I always felt bad that he got into the trailer and then not in the movie.

  4. The original Paul

    November 8th, 2010 at 4:32 pm

    Vern – I loved Michael Jai White as much as the next man who’s seen “Blood and Bone”, but that deleted scene was terrible. It’s a cliche’d scene, appallingly acted, that added nothing to the story except a “how badass is he?” moment for Carradine, and really had no business being in the movie in the first place. It’s an interesting aside, but it would’ve brought down the movie if they’d actually have included it. It’s sort of like the infamous “nunchucks” scene in “Enter the Dragon”. It’s gained a huge amount of notoriety that seems to ignore the fact that the editors were 100% correct to remove it in the first place.

    (Talking of scenes that shouldn’t be in “Kill Bill v2”, I’m still waiting to see the cut where they remove the ridiculous “Superman” monologue from the final confrontation.)

  5. Paul, the editors didn’t take out the nunchucks. Your country’s crazy-ass censors did. The rest of the world got the movie the way it was intended, nunchucks intact. You’ve been watching a diluted version of a badass movie.

    Basically I’m saying your whole life is a lie.

  6. I’m fine with the scene being cut out of Kill Bill, but the nunchakas out of Enter the Dragon? That’s nuts.

  7. Wait a minute… the UK censors nunchucks? WTF is wrong with nunchucks? Did someone try to assassinate the Queen with them?

  8. Next thing, Paul’s gonna try to tell us he’s only familiar with 3 Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles.

    Paul, you do know Michelangelo, right? The party dude? With the nunchakus? RIGHT?

  9. Remember as a kid when they had that anti-drug all-star cartoon special PSA and the TMNT Turtle they pick to represent da sewer is Michelangelo. You know, the one that sounded/acted like the residential doper?

  10. He was the one who liked skateboarding and eating pepperoni pizza bra.

  11. They all had the munchies for pizza because they were high on life, maaaaan.

    And Michelangelo was perpetually a little doped out & dizzy from all the breakdancing & nunchakuing. And from being spawned from radioactive material. And from living in the sewers.

  12. Michelangelo’s nunchaku weren’t censored, but the word NINJA in the title was changed to HERO. We get the same stupid cuts over in Ireland because we’re too small a market and we just get whatever crap they get in the UK.

    Also, the nunchaku scene in Enter the Dragon was put back in the DVD release.

    On related matters, I watched Flag of Iron last night, and a dude had an abacus that turned into nunchaku. Nice touch.

  13. So ninjas are illegal in Ireland? That is fucked up.

  14. Ninjas are legal, just too expensive to import if they don’t get them in the UK as well. We usually get the exact same DVD with a sticker for our censor’s office stuck over theirs.

    Actually, if I recall correctly,the film turtles were ninjas, but the cartoon turtles were heroes. Not sure what the thinking behind that was.

  15. To teach small, impressionable children that ninjas and heroes are the exact same thing, obviously.

  16. Right. Like that movie, HERO ASSASSIN.

  17. I called him “the guy from SPAWN” because that’s how Vern referred to him in the review.

    Actually, I loved that scene. I thought it was intentionally silly–a nice riff on those martial arts movies where fights happen just because fights need to happen. “We want revenge on our master!” It was very funny. But, of course, the scene is actually supposed to show you the awe that Uma has for Bill. After the fight, the way the camera moves in on her looking at him… Very nicely done.

  18. The original Paul

    November 9th, 2010 at 4:57 pm

    WE DO NOT CENSOR NUNCHUKS IN THE UK.

    And seriously, the American cut of “Enter the Dragon” had that insipid thirty-second scene of Bruce Lee farting about with two sticks tied together, while a bunch of guards watch vaguely on wondering if they should maybe do something? That pointless showcase for Bruce Lee’s egomania that does nothing but stop the movie dead? That flow-breaking, continuity-destroying showcase for Bru – oh, never mind, I’ve done the “showcase” thing before. Seriously though, you poor bastards. How do you even still breathe the air?

  19. Paul, no offense, but you don’t know what you’re talking about. The UK might not censor nunchucks anymore but they sure as hell did when ENTER THE DRAGON came out, and they continued doing so for years afterward as part of a host of bizarre and haphazard censorship rules. Maybe you got used to that butchered version and that’s why you have such a weird problem with the awesomeness of the nunchucks scene, but cutting that shit out because it “breaks the flow” is like cutting the musical numbers out of GUYS & DOLLS so because they distract from the plot.

  20. What’s HERO ASSASSIN about? A guy who assassinates heroes?

  21. Mr. Majestyk, is right. I think the reason they used to censor nunchucks in the UK is because nunchucks themselves were illegal, and therefor were cut from any film featuring them.

  22. Funnily enough I just caught up with Way of the Dragon on tv this week. I’d seen it before on VHS back in the day, when the back-alley fight was totally cut out. I couldn’t believe how long that went on for. Nunchucks were also excised from the TMNT movies. Shuriken got short shrift here too.

  23. I watched both volumes again back to back a few days ago, and out of curiosity looked up the reviews…have you really not did a review of Volume 1 Vern? Not even for aintitcool?

  24. I guess not. I promise I’ll do a thorough write-up some day when I watch them both again. I love these and they might be my most re-watched movies of the 21st century so far.

  25. My most rematched movie of the 21st century is WALK HARD:THE DEWEY COX story.

  26. Might as well wait until they finally release that complete 3 hour cut and do a comparison between the different versions, Vern.

    Whenever the hell that will be. We’ve been waiting for years. Maybe it will happen with the 10 year anniversary.

  27. Finally rewatched KILL BILL: THE STUDIO SAID I’M NOT ALLOWED TO MAKE A SINGLE 4 HOUR MOVIE WHEN IT COULD BE 2 MOVIE$ BUT BY THE WAY LET’S CUT OUT MICHAEL JAI WHITE’S SCENE ANYWAY, FOR PACING OR SOMETHING, CUZ I’D HATE TO BE ACCUSED OF RELEASING A ‘BLOATED’ FILM: VOLUME DEUX, and it might no longer be my least favorite Tarantino (which is like saying Miss Nebraska is the least hottest Miss America contestant).

    The only really weak scene in my opinion is the “assassin-conversation with a pregnancy test on the floor” scene, and at least that bullshit gets saved by
    1) that it’s a Bechdel-obliterating badass confrontation with great acting & Woo Zone-style gunplay
    and
    2) a funny ending/tag when the other assassin tells Beatrix “congratulations” and runs away.

    Same problem I had with part of the INGLOURIOUS BASTERDS basement-bar sequence where the blonde guy has an awkward conversation with Brad Pitt and the starlet/spy and you start wonder how long they can really keep pointing guns without firing anything but their stupid mouths. Too much expository babbling, no momentum, telling and not showing, etc.. But, despite this hiccup, I consider BASTERDS to be QT’s #1 best film (possibly in a 3 way tie), so…

    Anyway, the point I wanted to make here is that I really think Uma Thurman’s performance in the KILL BILL saga, especially part 2, might truly be one of the all time greatest film performances. It’s so goddamn physical, from head to toe. Literally. Her eyebrow wrinkles are as poignant & meaningful as her toe-wiggling moments. Her arms & legs are forces of nature, and her eyes might as well be fucking missile launch pads, replete with internal radar technology. And, most remarkably and most tear-inducingly, she’s believable as “Mommy.”

    I mean, like, Uma’s performance here is up there with fuckin’ Brando in ON THE WATERFRONT, Cage in FACE/OFF, Joel Grey in CABARET, Olivia de Havilland in THE HEIRESS, or Megan Fox’s torso in TRANSFORMERS.

    Almost as good as Val Kilmer in TOMBSTONE, but let’s not get too crazy; that Doc Holliday is unfuckwithable.

    In conclusion, go watch BLADE II again, and then watch KILL BILL 2 again.

  28. I re-watched vol 1 not too long ago, but I haven’t seen vol 2 since 2004, I too keep waiting for that damn director’s cut

  29. Soundtrack of the week I’m listening to is KILL BILL VOL 1. Condolences for posting it on this here KILL BILL VOL 2 thread, because, if you read the comments above you might get sucked into the nunchaku vortex perpetuated by Paul Whose Computer Has Now Gone Rogue And Taken On A Life Of It’s Own Like Hal 9000 Or Skynet. A storm is coming.

    But since there’s no KILL BILL VOL 1 review yet, here I am. I don’t buy many soundtracks, compared to the movies I buy, because it’s rare that one will stand out enough. I own less than a dozen. A few examples – CONAN THE BARBARIAN, THE LAST OF THE MOHICANS, IN GOOD COMPANY, PULP FICTION, RESERVOIR DOGS, JACKIE BROWN, KILL BILL 1&2, DRIVE. Listening to a great soundtrack like CONAN makes me want to watch the movie again, and vice-versa. I hate soundtracks that have music and songs ‘inspired by whatever movie fell off the production line that week’. You know, the songs weren’t in the actual movie, they just did a tie-in with Usher’s latest song to push the company’s sales up and target the teeny boppers who might buy it.

    Back to KILL BILL VOL 1. I like most of this album. A lot of it is instrumental like Run Fay Run by Isaac Hayes (the animated scene where Oren Ishii shows off her assassin skills on top of a building), and Green Hornet Theme (where The Bride is riding her motorbike through the streets to the showdown at the House Of Blue Leaves). My two absolute favorites, that get my blood pumping, are Battle Without Honor, which is basically a cool guitar riff with a slick drumbeat that plays while Oren Ishii and her posse are walking in slo-mo down a corridor. I remember this scene being a highlight in the trailer, and it was enough to get my arse in the cinema to see the movie 3 times in 3 weeks. Just so friggin cool. The other one is a cover of Dont Let Me Be Misunderstood by Santa Esmeralda, which plays while The Bride and Oren square off in the snow. The movie only plays the instrumental part of that song, which is a spanish-ish variation on the original, but on the soundtrack it plays for over 10 minutes and is never boring.

    There’s a couple pieces by RZA also but they didn’t do much for me, though his Ode To Oren Ishi is suitably grim the way it plays along side her fucked up back story.

  30. I actually own the soundtrack to MISSION:IMPOSSIBLE 2 (feat. Buckethead,Limp Bizkit and all kind of hideous crap).In hindsight I can´t believe I bought that album. You have permission to end my life if you will.

  31. Yeah KB1’s soundtrack is actually a really good compilation album. It’s one of my favourites too.

  32. The Original... Paul

    November 30th, 2014 at 6:10 am

    Shoot – I don’t own the MI:2 soundtrack but the film has some excellent ambient scoring. The pop-rocky stuff… yeah, maybe not. I don’t think the world would suffer too much if Limp Bizkit and all their songs disappeared from the face of the earth overnight.

    I have all of Tarantino’s soundtracks (of course). I think I’m missing JACKIE BROWN – I’ve never been a fan of the film – and DJANGO UNCHAINED, but otherwise I think I have ’em all. They’re generally not my favorite soundtracks to listen to though, and here’s why: Tarantino is a master of finding the perfect songs to put on film. I’m not sure that his soundtracks work as well off-screen. There are tracks from KILL BILL vols 1 and 2 that I can listen to on their own and just love (my favorite probably being the Malcolm McLaren cover from the scene where the bride meets Bill in KILL BILL v2) but overall I think that at least half of the songs work so much better on film than off it. (Sort of the opposite of HAYWIRE, where the scoring annoyed the crap out of me during the film, but sounded better when I went back and listened to it on its own.) I mean, honestly I don’t think much of the likes of “Miserylou” from PULP FICTION or, say, “Battle without Honour” or “Green Hornet Theme”, at least on their own. But put ’em in Tarantino’s films and they get the pulse racing.

    There are of course exceptions. “Son of a Preacher Man” from PULP FICTION or, say, “Little Green Bag”, “Magic Carpet Ride” or “Coconut” from RESERVOIR DOGS (honestly that might be my favorite Tarantino soundtrack to just listen to on its own) are all fantastic no matter how or where you hear them.

  33. “Honestly, I don’t think much of the likes of Battle Without Honour or Green Hornet Theme.” (paraphrased).

    I’ve had people in my car while playing this soundtrack, and when Green Hornet Theme comes on they usually say, what the fuck is this? It’s unusual I guess, but I fuckin crank it up. I love it because it reminds me of that great scene when The Bride lands in Tokyo in the wobbly plane, and you got the Crazy 88’s on motorbikes zooming around Oren’s limo, then The Bride pulls up on her bike next to the limo with her yellow suit and helmet on and just stares at them. Cool as shit.

    But yeah, on it’s own or out of context, I get how it could be grating to the eardrums. I don’t have the same problem with Battle Without Honour. That is just great music on it’s own.

  34. I liked the song and video Metallica did for MI:2, and the cover of “Have a Cigar” by Foo Fighters. But I’m in agreement with Paul, LB was the bane of my existence for awhile back then, having a brother who was a fan (and still maintains their 2nd album is good).

  35. So I watched VOL 1 again last night. I couldn’t help myself. I don’t think any of us here need an excuse to watch it again in all it’s blood spattered glory, but let me share a few things that stood out for me this time. Note – I was picking up on some of the smaller details in the film this time –

    – When The Bride and Copperhead are fighting in the house and they take a coffee break – notice the way the camera goes in for a close-up on The Bride’s knife being sheathed. The sound of the blade on leather is accentuated, as she drags it along the rim till it slips into the pouch.

    – The way Boss Tanaka’s head flies so smoothly across the conference table after Oren responds to his sour grapes.

    – During the battle at the House Of Blue Leaves, after The Bride impales three of the main Crazy 88er’s, there’s a close-up of her Hanzo sword as it reverberates like a tuning fork. She then hits it with the side of her fist to silence it.

    – Michael Parks vast collection of almost identical sunglasses mounted on his police car’s dashboard as he drives to the church.

    – At the Tokyo airport, The Bride walks past a wall sized advertisement featuring the glamorous Sofie Fatale in a cigarette commercial. A short time after, Ms Fatale would lose her arm, and soul, to The Bride’s Hanzo sword.

    – The words exchanged between Oren and Beatrix at the Tea House – “Silly rabbit.” “Trick surfer kids.” The implication of past friendship and camaraderie, now gone to hell.

    – And the coup de gra – not really a small detail, more of a fuck yeah, lets take it up another two levels – midway through the battle orgy at The Tea House, there’s a dramatic pause as The Bride holds an impaled Crazy 88er on her sword and moves around with him, looking for her next move. After she releases him she grabs a second sword, there’s another brief pause, then the drums and bass kick in on the soundtrack, and she goes fucking crazy with those swords.

  36. Wait, you mean “Trix are for kids,” right? Or is there some play on words I never picked up on there?

    Also I don’t remember the Sofie Fatale ad, I wonder if I missed that before?

  37. I’ve never watched it with subtitles so I could be hearing things. I’ll check it out.

  38. If you’re outside of the U.S., Darren, maybe you don’t know that “Silly rabbit, Trix are for kids” is a famous cereal commercial slogan said to a cartoon rabbit. I never noticed that it could be heard as “trick surfer kids,” but I like it.

    Thanks for the write-up. There’s so much in those movies to pick up on every time you watch them again.

  39. I’ll plead cultural ignorance on that one. If Tarantino were an Australian his dialogue would probably go something like –

    Oren – Just like a chocolate milkshake.

    Beatrix – Only crunchy.

    Or…

    Beatrix – Snap (lunges with an overhead swing)

    Oren – Crackle (blocks and slices Beatrix’ leg)

    Beatrix – Pop (separates Orens scalp from head)

    However, one good thing about my cultural ignorance of American breakfast cereals is that I’ve entertained this back story that The Deadly Viper Assassination Squad, when they’re not travelling the world killing people for vast sums of money, are spending their down time as a family hanging out at California beaches, surfing and having fun with Bill, like Bosley and The Angels.

    Yes, I like this fantasy. It makes me happy.

  40. Overall it’s a very satisfying movie, even if Trick Surfer Kids aren’t real.

  41. I would like to hope that while Beatrix catches up on her parenting, she school her kid properly when it comes to LONE WOLF AND CUB. SHOGUN ASSASSIN doesn´t entirely cut it.

  42. God I wish Tarantino would make another KILL BILL before he retires, I just love the world it’s set in (which is technically the wider Tarantinoverse I guess…), this world of assassins around every corner, where people who might appear average on the outside could be deadly assassins and where Japanese airplanes have holsters for your samurai sword (because in this world you never know when you might need it).

    Also, I don’t know if this is actually made clear in the movies themselves, but I read somewhere that Bill was originally just a marital arts movie nerd who decided to live the life for real, that’s an interesting detail.

  43. Rewatched 8 DIAGRAM POLE FIGHTER just now.. I am pretty sure that music cue that happens when Bill gets “Kill Bill”-ed (spoiler)in Volume 2 is from this movie. Sure that cue could very well been in other Shaw brothers films, but I never heard it in any other.

    Also, still my favourite Shaw film.

  44. The Original Paul

    December 1st, 2014 at 12:06 pm

    Darren – I put that badly. I like ’em even without the movie, but they just don’t have the same impact for me.

    “Green Hornet Theme” while driving? That’s a recipe for a road accident if ever I heard one.

  45. The Original Paul

    December 1st, 2014 at 12:08 pm

    And I also keep noticing new things in “Kill Bill vol 1” whenever I watch it. It took me two viewings to notice the bit from Bruce Lee’s “Fist of Fury” when the Bride takes on the first few of O-Ren’s thugs, for example.

  46. I’ve really got to re-watch all the Bruce Lee’s and Shaw Brothers films. I saw a lot of them in my teens, but I don’t remember them well enough to pick up on Tarantino’s references to them.

  47. Darren – watch the remastered re releases by Celestial Pictures. Shaw Brothers made some gorgeous pictures in them olden days and badly cropped and dubbed vhs-copies are a disgrace to them.

  48. Shoot, a lot of those films got released over here under the Dragon Dynasty label, which I think comes under the Celestial banner. I picked up a few recently for a couple bucks – 36th CHAMBER OF SHAOLIN, HEROES OF THE EAST and 5 DEADLY VENOMS. What one would you recommend I watch first as an entry point to the Shaw Brothers world?

  49. You got some classic ones there. 36TH CHAMBER OF SHAOLIN is possibly the one with the best story and training sequences. HEROES OF THE EAST is funny as well as awesome. “But Still”, 8 DIAGRAM POLE FIGHTER is my absolute favorite. I got that from Dragon Dynasty. The action is simply spectacular. Good use of poles means people lose good amount of teeth. Perfect causality.

    I have some love for older stuff like King Hu´s COME DRINK WITH ME from 1966 starring Cheng Pei Pei (from CROUCHING TIGER)as a badass women swordfighter. It´s stylistically more reminiscent of samurai movies , how the action is told in violent bursts rather than long fluid movements of the kung fu films. Also a movie that looks gorgeous remastered and so does Cheng pei pei in this one.

  50. As others have mentioned, I would like to see a Kill Bill sequel just to revisit the world that Tarantino has created. It doesn’t even have to be a direct sequel that follows the further adventures of the Bride. It could be spiritual sequel that tells a different story in the world of assassins and Hanzo swords.

  51. The Original Paul

    December 2nd, 2014 at 12:53 pm

    Darren – watch 36TH CHAMBER OF SHAOLIN for what has got to be one of the best movies specifically about training to be a fighter that I’ve ever seen. The others I can’t advise you about because I haven’t seen them, but 36TH CHAMBER is fantastic.

  52. Sonny Chiba died of COVID today :(

  53. Just saw that a few minutes ago, and was completely bummed out. Only 2 days ago, I was watching THE FAST AND THE FURIOUS: THE TOYKO DRIFT with my god-son and when Chiba showed up in that, I had to pause the movie and tell this 11 year old kid that he was looking at one of the last remaining old-school acting gods still alive…. and then no, I couldn’t show him any of Chiba’s greatest movies because he’s too damn young.

    And now… he’s gone. Damn COVID.

    I recommend checking him out in THE STREET FIGHTER (the first one only), WOLF GUY, NINJA WARS, SAMURAI REINCARNATION, KARATE KIBA, THE SHADOW WARS tv series, and KILL BILL. But whatever he was in, he was never less than magnetic and instantly upgraded everything just by walking on camera. The only actor I could even compare him to would be Gene Hackman, but guys, I don’t think Gene ever hit a guy in the head so hard that the camera had to switch to X-Ray vision to show his fist fracturing the dude’s skull into itty bitty pieces. So that’s 1 more point for Sonny.

    Rest in power and arigato, Chiba-san.

  54. I’m no Chiba expert, but facts is facts: My man was so cool they named weed after him.

  55. RIP Sonny Chiba. Time to stop putting off my STREET FIGHTER retrospective

  56. Mr.Shemp, I would recommend all three STREETFIGHTERS. Of course, the first one is a must because of the action. But the second has some visuals that makes it a better movie experience as a whole. And the third one, albeit a little too strange, developes the character of Surugi in interesting ways.

    I feel I’m already quite tired of the “KILL BILL star” thing.

  57. Hey pegsman! Oh, I agree with you that the 2nd and 3rd STREETFIGHTER movies are worth catching – I just feel like they don’t hold a candle to the 1st film at all – they are strong 3 star flicks, while the original SF is 5 stars, hands down.

    I guess I was trying to pick some varied roles for Chiba in my list from different genres? And I apologize but I just had to throw KILL BILL in there because Sonny really is great in it, even though it could stand to have twice as much of him in it. I know QT cut out a metric ton of footage out, hopefully no scenes with Chiba.

  58. Pegsman, agree. Tokyo Drift is more recent!

    I had to include KB in my obit headine but I also included Street Fighter.

  59. Let it go, Pegsman. Otherwise, just imagine how tired you’re gonna feel when Franco Nero dies and all the headlines are “DJANGO UNCHAINED star dies.”

    Personally, if these headlines are the price we pay for Tarantino’s enthusiasms, then I am prepared to pay it. I’ve been surprised and pleased by the level of coverage Chiba’s death has gotten, but in my heart I know that “Revered Japanese star Tarantino never mentioned dies” is a story that would’ve run exactly nowhere. Witness, for example, the global indifference to the death of Kunie Tanaka in March. Clearly, Chiba’s star was much brighter, but Tanaka had a 50-year career, won multiple awards in Japan and starred in the BATTLES WITHOUT HONOUR AND HUMANITY series, which kickstarted the moden yakuza fillm, not forgetting his appearance in Kurosawa’s SANJURO. If Tarantino can shine a light on good things – instead of maligning dead stars who can’t defend themselves! – I’m for it.

  60. With Franco I suspect it will be “husband of Vanessa Redgrave and star of the musical CAMELOT”.

  61. I doubt any Franco Obit would omit ENTER THE NINJA or GENERAL ESPERANZA in DIE HARD 2

  62. Apologize if this has been brought up before but watching this movie again today and reading the credits their is a grip guy with the nickname THE ROCK. who’s mentioned in Death Proof. I hope that’s of interest to someone.

Leave a Reply





XHTML: You can use: <a href="" title=""> <abbr title=""> <acronym title=""> <b> <blockquote cite=""> <cite> <code> <del datetime=""> <em> <i> <q cite=""> <s> <strike> <strong>