Kill Bill: Vol. 1

Several years after the fading of unbearable hype, Kill Bill is still a spectacle that has no equal in the realm of multi-genre action. Despite Tarantino being somewhat annoying from a media standpoint during this period, his sense of revenge's tempo, the soundtrack, and the supporting characters were almost perfect. And when Hattori Hanzo appears and I swallow all previous prejudices, there is nothing left but to give it five stars. (04/20/2005)

I really like older Tarantino films, and even though they are in genres that I don't particularly enjoy, Tarantino managed to direct them creatively and with added value, which every film fan must appreciate. Whether it was Reservoir Dogs, Pulp Fiction, or Jackie Brown, I always found something that enriched me. Kill Bill marked the beginning of the era of Tarantino films without added value, which may fascinate genre fans with their "purity," but I completely avoid them. Kill Bill pays homage to East Asian action films, which is something that doesn't appeal to me at all. The characters lack even minimal depth, and there's no need to talk about the screenplay. It is completely empty, purposeless nonsense, lacking emotions and character psychology. I would add that it has decent camera work and music, for which it deserves one star from me. Overall impression 25%. (02/16/2008)

The positives are clear: it's nice and colorful, it's got a good camera and nice hit music. It also has a "cool" pulp aesthetic. That's what pets like, right? And it's sweet postmodern “shit". A beautiful video clip. Great craft, Quentin is good at that. As well as magnificent boredom and the best filmed vacuum I can imagine. Pulp Fiction may have been silly, but at least it had something inside. Kill Bill is only able to pile up clip sequences and obscure the absolute lack of narrative dynamics with subtitled chapters, nice manga sequences, and a stylish (and utterly self-serving) narrative multi-voice. Dear Quentin, I thought I didn't like you, but Kill Bill brings a whole new intensity to our relationship. And Uma is quite pretty... It's a good thing you and I have something to talk about, man. Bleh! (09/21/2005)

The last time I met Bill was about twenty years ago. Since then, time has taken its cruel toll on me and David Carradine. I gave this film five stars back in the day, and I'd happily give it five stars again today because I enjoyed all those gory action scenes (yes, including the animated ones) and the cheesy clichés that Tarantino deliberately used in the film (with glee, I’m sure). I was even willing to get over all those many logic holes except for one. The waking up from a four-year coma was a bit too much for me. I guess I take it personally, but I just couldn’t get over that bullshit. I was only dead for four days, spent the next month staring intensely at the ceiling, and when they finally managed to sit me up after that relatively short period of time, I found that the speed of the earth's rotation had dramatically increased, so I had to be propped up to keep from collapsing. And then it took ten days of practice before my useless rubber limbs started resembling legs again. So, all that nonsense about just thirteen hours after four years made me take one star off my rating. Otherwise, the film was a standard Tarantino wackiness (just the way I like it) as in: a lot of severed body parts, oodles of blood (black and white, animated, and regular), and a bunch of over-the-top nonsense (the kind that I didn’t mind). I was just surprised by how light on dialogue it was. / Lesson learned: Enjoy life. (09/18/2022)

A cool rip-off of Shogun Assassin with references to a couple dozen other films. One big stylistic exercise, which in the shadow of the brilliant Volume II completely loses its meaning and unnecessarily takes away from the credit of the whole. ♫ OST song rating: 4/5 (05/13/2005)