*RANT* OVERRATED: KILL BILL 2 [Liam]
First off, my problem isn't that I was expecting a repeat of Kill Bill 1 except in sequel form. I didn't like that movie that much anyway. Also, I'm not gonna launch into a tirade about what a pilfering fanboy Tarantino is, because that would take us towards Asia and rampant borrowing, and in entirely the wrong direction for what I wanna say.
While I'm at it, I'd like to add that my brother slapped the hell out of me within my first 24 hours outside of the womb, and that if it wasn't for that maybe I'd be the smarter Boylan kid.
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
Ok. Got all that out of the way.
Kill Bill 1 & 2 are supposed to be action-type movies, specifically of the "revenge quest" model. It's a common approach for old-school martial arts movies and the like, lone hero versus an identifiable hit list of villains. It presupposes two things that make it work; (1) we empathize with the plight of the hero and the wrong that is being avenged (2) we know a certain number of asses are going to be kicked before it's all over.
I'm actually gonna tackle the latter first, because it's a pretty easy one to throw out there; the hit list represents a pact between the storyteller and the audience, that we're gonna get a certain number of "mini-boss" battles on the road to revenge, or at least a well-put together montage with a couple notable showdowns. While this is a formulaic way to do action, I like it. You know you're not gonna just have one car chase and one shootout. The action will be well developed, segmented over the story and hopefully diverse enough to fill out an entire movie. It will help drive the story, rather than simply dress it.
In Kill Bill 2 the Mamba in the suitcase gets more action than the Bride. There's THREE (count 'em... Bill, Budd, Blinky) major showdowns left, which eventually amount to one relatively tepid fight and a FUCK TON of frustratingly self-indulgent dialogue. !!Surprise!! We're gonna watch Carradine talk about his favorite fucking superhero for like 8 hours in the most contrived and long-winded showdown in the history of modern cinema... truth serum was handled better in "True Lies" than KB2.
As for the other requirement, that we empathize with the hero's quest and that therefore we the audience are into the whole revenge quest and rooting for the good guy... if there could possibly have been a more smug and less sympathetic protagonist I would have liked to have seen it, out of pure morbid curiousity. Revenge was hard enough to swallow when it was Uma taking away Vivica's motherhood and married life in the name of her own (yeah wow hardcore, I know) or killing like 8 million yakuza and Lucy Liu, but when she's not even fighting and just talking to motherfuckers it's straight-up lame. Hotblooded revenge is the only kind people get on board with in movies, getting up and kicking some asses the same night. When it's like 5 years later and everybody else has gotten on with their lives, it just seems silly.
If she's fighting it's at least somewhat compelling.
I she's talking shit and plotting it's worth waiting through.
If she's having a civil chat about god knows what retarded nonsense, it's NAP TIME.
Spinning your wheels and doing nothing is what BLOGS are for, Quentin you wack motherfucker!
Thanks for reading :)
While I'm at it, I'd like to add that my brother slapped the hell out of me within my first 24 hours outside of the womb, and that if it wasn't for that maybe I'd be the smarter Boylan kid.
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
Ok. Got all that out of the way.
Kill Bill 1 & 2 are supposed to be action-type movies, specifically of the "revenge quest" model. It's a common approach for old-school martial arts movies and the like, lone hero versus an identifiable hit list of villains. It presupposes two things that make it work; (1) we empathize with the plight of the hero and the wrong that is being avenged (2) we know a certain number of asses are going to be kicked before it's all over.
I'm actually gonna tackle the latter first, because it's a pretty easy one to throw out there; the hit list represents a pact between the storyteller and the audience, that we're gonna get a certain number of "mini-boss" battles on the road to revenge, or at least a well-put together montage with a couple notable showdowns. While this is a formulaic way to do action, I like it. You know you're not gonna just have one car chase and one shootout. The action will be well developed, segmented over the story and hopefully diverse enough to fill out an entire movie. It will help drive the story, rather than simply dress it.
In Kill Bill 2 the Mamba in the suitcase gets more action than the Bride. There's THREE (count 'em... Bill, Budd, Blinky) major showdowns left, which eventually amount to one relatively tepid fight and a FUCK TON of frustratingly self-indulgent dialogue. !!Surprise!! We're gonna watch Carradine talk about his favorite fucking superhero for like 8 hours in the most contrived and long-winded showdown in the history of modern cinema... truth serum was handled better in "True Lies" than KB2.
As for the other requirement, that we empathize with the hero's quest and that therefore we the audience are into the whole revenge quest and rooting for the good guy... if there could possibly have been a more smug and less sympathetic protagonist I would have liked to have seen it, out of pure morbid curiousity. Revenge was hard enough to swallow when it was Uma taking away Vivica's motherhood and married life in the name of her own (yeah wow hardcore, I know) or killing like 8 million yakuza and Lucy Liu, but when she's not even fighting and just talking to motherfuckers it's straight-up lame. Hotblooded revenge is the only kind people get on board with in movies, getting up and kicking some asses the same night. When it's like 5 years later and everybody else has gotten on with their lives, it just seems silly.
If she's fighting it's at least somewhat compelling.
I she's talking shit and plotting it's worth waiting through.
If she's having a civil chat about god knows what retarded nonsense, it's NAP TIME.
Spinning your wheels and doing nothing is what BLOGS are for, Quentin you wack motherfucker!
Thanks for reading :)
1 Comments:
LOL I sense much anger...yeah I heard from a lot of people that number 2 was fucking snooze fest from hell...
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