Now we know where Quentin Tarantino was hiding all the plot, quirky dialogue and character development missing from “Kill Bill Vol. 1,” his delirious ode to his film influences.
“Kill Bill Vol. 2” packs so much of Mr. Tarantino’s unmistakable off-center dialogue and tender portraiture it begs the question, why did the director slice and dice the two installments as he did?
“Vol. 2” could use a dash of the original’s style-drenched fight sequences, and “Vol. 1” cried out for context to explain the bloodletting.
“Vol. 2” opens with a dishy Uma Thurman addressing the camera from behind the wheel of a slick roadster. It’s a vintage 1940s film moment, down to the fake background unspooling behind her.
She’s never looked lovelier, and while the director will later put her through some starkly ugly paces, Mr. Tarantino knows how to frame her imperfect beauty like no other.
From then on, Mr. Tarantino pilfers from the ’60s and ’70s, both visually and for the expectedly trippy soundtrack.
We know the story’s bullet points from the first film. The Bride (Miss Thurman) is left for dead by Bill (David Carradine) and his fellow assassins on her wedding day, and she’s determined to kill every last one of them before she’s through.
The film, again, is broken into chapters, and the first sends us back in time to the minutes before the wedding chapel massacre.
The sequence, shot in sand-blasted black and white, crackles with sexual and thematic tension. We know what happens next, and watching Bill give the Bride his kiss-off packs more emotional heft than any scene in the first film.
The scene wraps with a delirious pull-away shot that magnifies the brutality, even though we don’t see a single bullet zing through the air.
From there we rejoin Budd (Michael Madsen), Bill’s soused brother and a seemingly toothless retiree from the Bride’s old assassin squad. Look closer. Mr. Madsen’s Budd is far more dangerous, and yet vulnerable, than we first perceive.
A subsequent chapter finds the Bride training under cruel martial arts master Pei Mei (Chinese actor Gordon Liu). Mr. Tarantino indulges himself with some visual shout-outs to the schlock karate films he clearly adores.
You can practically hear the ex-video store clerk cackling just off-set.
Flash forward to the present, and the next target on the Bride’s hit list is Elle Driver (a ferocious Daryl Hannah, wearing an eye patch). Their death battle is a set piece for the ages, one which wraps with a gruesome, yet condign touch.
When the Bride and Bill finally meet, Mr. Tarantino has one last ace up his sleeve, which leaves the Bride dumbstruck. It also adds a new layer to Miss Thurman’s already admirable turn.
Mr. Carradine, another pop culture icon reborn under Mr. Tarantino’s tutelage, brings all of Bill’s mercurial power to bear in a sly, stunning performance. How lucky for all those involved that Warren Beatty passed on the role.
Mr. Tarantino may be obsessed with swordplay, but the mystery of the “Kill Bill” series is why he didn’t skinny down or cut entirely the pretentiously drawn out moments to forge one three- hour masterpiece.
Instead, we’re left with two very different halves of a saga that isn’t meaty enough for cult status, despite the auteur’s feverish devotion.
Yet scattered throughout the films are brilliant performances, both large and minuscule, that could ripen with subsequent viewings.
For all their flaws, both “volumes” of “Kill Bill” are told with such grand style that they’re still worth savoring.
***
WHAT: “Kill Bill Vol. 2”
RATING: R (Strong violence, coarse language and alcohol use)
CREDITS: Written and directed by Quentin Tarantino. Cinematography by Robert Richardson. Original music by The RZA and Robert Rodriguez.
RUNNING TIME: 136 minutes
WEB SITE https://killbill.movies.go.com/
MAXIMUM RATING: FOUR STARS
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