'Kill Bill' bleeds profusely

Friday, October 10, 2003

By Ron Weiskind, Post-Gazette Movie Editor

So many arms, legs and heads get chopped off in Quentin Tarantino's "Kill Bill: Volume 1" that we shouldn't be surprised the movie itself is a bloody stump.

Tarantino's cut of "Kill Bill" ran more than three hours. His distributor, Miramax, in its infinite wisdom, decided to release it in two parts of more reasonable length. Volume 2 comes out in February.

	'KILL BILL: VOLUME 1' Rating: R for strong bloody violence, language and some sexual content. Players: Uma Thurman, Lucy Liu, David Carradine. Director: Quentin Tarantino.

So, presumably, do the parts of "Kill Bill" that fill the gaping holes left in Volume 1, and I'm not referring to what's left of the bodies in this chopsocky orgy.

Many viewers won't care about boring things like motivation or character. They'll be satisfied that Tarantino -- Mr. Cool himself -- is paying tribute to the Hong Kong martial-arts films he loves, allowing himself the indulgence of calling the movie "The Fourth Film by Quentin Tarantino."

"Kill Bill" literally spews fountains of blood, refers to pulp movies meaningful only to film geeks like Tarantino, contains some visually breathtaking sequences and allows Uma Thurman to kick serious rump.

Tarantino's characters are usually larger than life, and his movies teeter on the edge of the envelope he's pushing. But until now, there was always something pushing back.

In "Pulp Fiction," for example, we meet the characters played by Samuel L. Jackson and John Travolta while they are discussing fast food and foot massages in colorful language and unusual contexts -- like why, in Paris, a Quarter Pounder is called a Royale with Cheese. The movie lets us enjoy their patter and establishes them as likable guys before it tells us they are hit men and shows them blowing people away.

In "Kill Bill" we know why Thurman's character, known only as The Bride, seeks revenge. Bill (a barely glimpsed David Carradine), head of an assassination squad she once worked for, kills everyone in her wedding party. He thinks The Bride is dead, too, but she survives in a coma for four years. What we don't know -- and I assume we'll find out in Volume 2 -- is why he did it.

The movie's first action sequence shows The Bride going after one of her former colleagues, Vernita (Vivica A. Fox), now retired and living in the suburbs with her young daughter. The two women have a vividly rendered knife fight interrupted by the child's arrival on the school bus. The humor is vintage Tarantino, but of course it doesn't last. The scene ends with a stoic lack of emotion that is 180 degrees removed from the shock and sadness we feel when Travolta's character is suddenly killed in "Pulp Fiction."

Most of the characters in "Kill Bill" come off as two-dimensional. So it is ironic that the most wrenching emotion in the film occurs in its stunning anime sequence -- the cartoon within the cartoon, so to speak -- depicting the tragedy that shaped the character of another target on the Bride's list, Japanese crime boss O-Ren Ishii (Lucy Liu).

They eventually square off in the movie's longest set piece, a martial-arts battle royal (and cheesy, too) inside a restaurant. Thurman turns a samurai sword into a weapon of mass destruction, killing scores of Ishii's henchmen in a scene that will leave your stomach churning from the blood and guts left all over the floor.

Tarantino's movies have always been considered violent, but the bloodletting came in intense spurts in his previous films. The threat of violence was more pervasive -- you knew it was coming, you knew it would be bad, but you didn't know when. The anticipation heightened the actual gore.

Not here. "Kill Bill" bleeds prolifically from beginning to end. Tarantino depicts oceans of blood gushing from so many bodies that you know he's using it for laughs, trying to temper the effect. But it just comes off as silly.

Yes, I know he's trying to evoke the spirit of the Hong Kong chopsocky films. Heck, he's trying to make the ultimate chopsocky film. Fine. Don't try to make us think it's art.

But Tarantino tries to have it both ways. The final showdown between O-Ren Ishii and The Bride takes place outdoors, in a formal garden with snow lightly falling and music swelling. It's beautiful to watch, just like a scene inside the restaurant where the lights go out and the fighters dance their violent ballet silhouetted against a blue backlit screen.

The one bit of nobility in "Kill Bill" is provided by martial-arts legend Sonny Chiba, who plays Hattori Hanzo, creator of the finest, most deadly samurai swords on the planet. He has retired from his craft, wishing no one else to die from an instrument made by his hands. But as The Bride reminds him, he trained Bill. He agrees that he bears responsibility and makes her a sword.

Chiba plays him perfectly and Tarantino stages the scene with the proper reverence. More of that would have gone a long way. Maybe we'll get it in Volume 2. We shouldn't have had to wait.