Monday, June 3, 2013

Kill Bill: The Whole Bloody Affair (2011)

A former assassin (Uma Thurman) seeks vengeance upon her former co-workers who left her for dead in a massacre at her wedding.

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Boy do I love genre films. So what if they hardly ever get love at The Oscars? Just because a large percentage of genre films deservedly belong in the discount bin at RiteAid, doesn't mean that the tree itself is rotten. A Western is just as capable of imparting insight into the human condition as some melodrama and a horror film can reach parts of your brain that some arty foreign film could never dream of stimulating. It's all just a matter of where the filmmaker chooses to take the genre and what subtext they choose to imbue within its confines. At the surface, Kill Bill is a revenge story: woman done wrong wreaks vengeance upon a series of people responsible for her misery. But when you really think about it and take away all of the blood and samurai swords, Kill Bill is a film about how tough it can be to leave behind a wild and reckless life in favor of the simple yet enriching joys of motherhood. Had this film starred Meryl Streep and been set in Manhattan with cutting remarks in place of actual cutting, it would have received all of the Oscars. When you really stop and think about it, the line between Kill Bill and Kramer vs. Kramer is pretty thin. There's even a Vs. in the title! Just sayin...

PS: Doesn't the end credit sequence kick serious ass?

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