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Kill Bill - Volume One
Starring: Uma Thurman, David Carradine, Daryl Hannah, Michael Madsen, Lucy Liu Director: Quentin Tarantino Average Rating: 
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If you like "Kill Bill - Volume One", you might also like ...
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| Customer Reviews 1-5 of 1129 | NEXT >> |
2008-12-30I thought Pulp Fiction was the best film of the 90s, which pains me to say, because the decade contains Goodfellas and Martin Scorcese is my favorite director. When you concider PF along with resevoir Dogs and the True Romance screenplay, Tarantino emerges as one of the singular voices of the past 35 years. But it seems he has lost it. Yes, there are flashes of brilliance here (Uma's intial meeting with fighting master Pei Mei is mesmerizingly cool and surreal). However, it seems as if more than 50% of this film is spent in having to listen to David Carradine's Bill ramble on about the film's backstory. It's a film Quentin, not a novel.
2008-10-08Kill Bill - Volume One
This is my first Quentine Tarantino film. Editing is ultimate. Wow! What Music! Uma Thurman gives a terrific performence. I knever knew Michael Madsen or Carradine at that time. Both actors were my Dad's-time-guys. But after seeing Kill Bill, I have pin-ups of Madsen in my room. Paps always used to speak of 'resevoir Dogs', 'Jackie Brown' etc..but they were not 'my-period' films. Even Daryl Hannah! I knew her only as the 'mermaid' from 'Splash'. I saw KILL BILL on the BIG SCREEN and became hooked. Now I do not miss a single film by Tarantino.
2008-09-10I never really cared for action films nor did I cared for Quentin Tarantino untill I saw this and other films he made. I enjoy watching this flim from begining to finish. I thought it could've done without the Anime cartoon but the rest of the movie was great and I can't beleive we have to wait a decade or 2 for part 3!
2008-08-15WARNING: This review contains spoilers!
Note: In my sumary of the plot I have put the film's story into chronological order so that events unfold sequentially. This is not the order in which the events of the film are actualy shown.
Quentin Tarantino (director of resevoir Dogs and Pulp Fiction) has often been called one of the most violence-obsessed filmmakers in America, a title that he would ocassionally protest. Now we can see why he would have objected to it, he simpley hadn't earned that honor yet. But let it be known to all that Quentin Tarantino, or Q.T. as he sometimes referrs to himself, is now an offical auteur of the action film. His bloody kung fu saga, Kill Bill, is proof of this. Here he pays homage to his favorite exploitation films of the `70s and `80s* with the giddy enthusiasm of a teenaged fanboy.
Kill Bill Vol. 1 tells the story of The Bride, a former assassin with the Deadly Viper assasination Squad (DiVAS), who is brutally attacked and left for dead durring her wedding rehersal by her ex boss/lover Bill. The Bride loses everything and everyone she cares about including her husband-to-be, her friends and her unborn child. After being shot in the head by Bill himself, The Bride sinks into a coma and awakens four whole years later. While she was comatose a hospital nurse sold her body to perverts who would have sex with her. On the day of her ressurection she kills the nurse and the creep who paid to have his way with her, thus beggining a cycle of cold bloody revenge. Her targets: Bill and every one of the Deadly Vipers. Her goal: Kill `em all. Her mission begins with a trip to Japan where she asks the legendary sword maker, Hattori Hanzo, to give her "Japanese steel". He refuses saying that he no longer makes instruments of death but when she explains that only his swords are up to the task of killing Bill, who was once Hanzo's student therefore making him partially reponsible for Bill's wicked deeds, then he agrees to make her his finest sword, a katana with no equal. He also warns her that before her journey for revenge can begin that she must be sure that she will not falter no matter what. The Bride then leaves with her new weapon and prepairs for an epic battle with O-Ren Ishii, a half Japanese, half Chinese, Asian American who's become the leader of a powerfull yakuza crime syndicate.
When O-Ren was just a young girl she witnessed the horrible murders of her father and mother and she vowed revenge. At the age of twelve she fulfilled her desire for blood when she slew the man reponsible. She quickly became one of the youngest and deadliest assasins in the world, which is why Bill took her under his wing.
After an amazing showdown with O-Ren and her sword-weilding gang, The Bride hunts down #2 on her list of people to kill, Vernita Green. The Bride and Vernita engage in vicious hand-to-hand combat (with a brief intermission when Vernita's young daughter comes home from school) before Vernita meets her doom before the eyes of her young daughter. But things are never as simple as they seem and "Revenge is never a straight line." While The Bride continues on her journey to kill Bill, we learn of a secret that may be her undoing: her daughter, the child that she beleived to be dead when she was assaulted on the day of her wedding rehersal four years earlier, is still alive and living with her daddy, Bill.
Some Tarantino fans have complained that this film is a departure from his dialogue-driven serio-comedies about carismatic criminals and lowlifes, but even as this is true Kill Bill is a definitive Tarantino film. Darkly humerous, graphically violent and as irreverent as always, his films polarize, provoke, and entertain audiences, which is why Kill Bill is quintessesitally Quentin.
The film is rounded out by a terrifically diverse cast including Uma Thurman as The Bride, Lucy Liu as O-Ren Ishii, Vivica A. Fox as Vernita Green, Michael Madsen as Budd, Daryl Hannah as Elle Driver, David Carradine as Bill, and Sonny Chiba as Hattori Hanzo.
The DVD is a must-have for Tarantino fans, however be warned that a more elaborate DVD release may be on the way. Special features include the Making of Kill Bill featurette, two musical performences by the 5,6,7,8s and trailers for Tarantino's other films.
* Here are some of the films and television shows that inspired Q.T. to make Kill Bill:
Once Upon a Time in the West
Bruce Lee Ultimate Collection
Lone Wolf and Cub Box Set
Fox in a Box - Featuring Pam Grier
Lady Snowblood
Yakuza Graveyard
Charlie's Angels - The Complete First Season
Shogun Assassin
shaddow Warriors - The Complete First Season
2008-06-16This movie is a must see and a must have for all you Tarantino fan. This movie to overly violent and bloody. Normally I don't like movies like that. However, it ranks amoung one of my favorite movies.
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| Editorial Review |
Quentin Tarantino's Kill Bill, Vol. 1 is trash for connoisseurs. From his opening gambit (including a "Shaw-Scope" logo and gaudy '70s-vintage "Our Feature Presentation" title card) to his cliffhanger finale (a teasing lead-in to 2004's Vol. 2), Tarantino pays loving tribute to grindhouse cinema, specifically the Hong Kong action flicks and spaghetti Westerns that fill his fervent brain--and this frequently breathtaking movie--with enough cinematic references and cleverly pilfered soundtrack cues to send cinephiles running for their reference books. Everything old is new again in Tarantino's humor-laced vision: he steals from the best while injecting his own oft-copied, never-duplicated style into what is, quite simply, a revenge flick, beginning with the near-murder of the Bride (Uma Thurman), pregnant on her wedding day and left for dead by the Deadly Viper Assassination Squad (or DiVAS)--including Lucy Liu and the unseen David Carradine (as Bill)--who become targets for the Bride's lethal vengeance. Culminating in an ultraviolent, ultra-stylized tour-de-force showdown, Tarantino's fourth film is either brilliantly (and brutally) innovative or one of the most blatant acts of plagiarism ever conceived. Either way, it's hyperkinetic eye-candy from a passionate film-lover who clearly knows what he's doing. --Jeff Shannon
If you like "Kill Bill - Volume One", you might also like ...
|
Kill Bill - Volume Two |
Pulp Fiction (Two-Disc Collector's Edition) |
Sin City |
Reservoir Dogs |
Jackie Brown (Two-Disc Collector's Edition) |
