Kill Bill, Vol. 2 2004
About a week after seeing Kill Bill Vol. 1 I got Vol. 2. It is good to have a break in between the movies because although I was tired of all the violence and action of the first, I found myself nonetheless looking forward to Volume 2.
This is a very different movie than Volume 1. Whereas Vol. 1 was very much a martial arts movie, this is more conventional, with all but one chapter taking place in the southwest. In the DVD extras, Tarantino says this is a spaghetti western take on the story whereas the first had a strong eastern influence. Not a fan of martial arts movies, this volume is more to my liking, but I still found it lacking. We meet characters played by Michael Madsen and Darryl Hannah and the title character by David Carradine. Madsen is given some depth, but not the backstory that he really deserves. Hannah isn’t given much depth despite a speech about the dangers of black mambas. Bill is fleshed out much better, with some back story and a humanizing twist at the end. And Uma Thurman’s The Bride is given substantially more backstory, but despite all of her training and her reputation as the most dangerous woman in the world, seems to make some pretty bad decisions on how to exact her revenge. A fight in a mobile home is a highlight as the characters struggle to use long swords in narrow hallways with low ceilings.
So despite being a different movie, I still found myself satisfied with Tarantino’s flourishes, but not enthusastic about this movie. The writing seemed uneven and the ending wasn’t the big payoff one expected. Like the first one, I’ll give this a B.
Written: 23 Jun 2006