On the QT, Part IX: Kill Bill - The Whole Bloody Affair (2003/2004)

Writer's Note: Sorry for the slight delay in posting this one- we're having termite problems at the house, which has caused us to have extensive renovations. They are very noisy and it's pretty much impossible to work under those conditions, so I've gotten a little behind over the last two weeks or so. I had a feeling I should have started this series a little earlier, but who would have saw this coming?

Anyway, I'm doing all of QT's films, regardless, and my review of the new one will come out when it comes out, obviously. I plan to see the film at least twice in theaters- once with a packed audience on opening weekend, and again at a hopefully less so matinee later on. So, by the time I do review it, I imagine most of you will have a chance to have seen it, which is good, especially if I get into spoiler territory. (Don't worry, I'll let you know if I do.)

In the meantime, sorry for the slight delay, and rest assured, I'm getting these done ASAP! 😉

While Jackie Brown was a huge success with critics, who called it his best effort to date, audiences were a bit underwhelmed with the film and negative word of mouth led to dwindling box office numbers, with the film's ultimate gross paling in comparison to Pulp Fiction. While proud of the film, Tarantino opted to take an even longer break between films this time around, wanting to get the next one absolutely right. It would end up taking six long years.

For his next effort, he decided to tackle an idea first conceived by him and Uma Thurman while shooting Pulp. Tarantino mentioned to her that he eventually wanted to do a homage to the 70's-era martial arts flicks he'd grown up loving. Thurman then pitched an idea of how to start it: a beaten-down bride, clad in her wedding dress and covered in blood... but not quite dead.

With that, QT was off and running, but it didn't happen overnight, obviously. After initially writing down a potential outline of what might happen next, Tarantino shelved the idea in the short term and ultimately wouldn't return to it until after Jackie Brown was finished, part of the reason being that Thurman was pregnant and couldn't do the film right away, anyway, and more importantly, he outright refused to do it with anyone else. He then spent the following few years rewatching all the films he loved growing up, and writing the script in the meantime as he went through them all.

Tarantino even went so far as to relocate to New York City to be close to Thurman and her then-newborn daughter, Maya. Thurman and Tarantino would bat ideas for the film off of one another, as QT furiously wrote and rewrote the script accordingly. The final product ended up being over two hundred pages, the longest thing he had written since the 500-page script that encompassed both True Romance and Natural Born Killers.

In earlier drafts, Bill was to have been played by longtime Hollywood star Warren Beatty, of Bonnie & Clyde fame. As such, the character was more suave and debonair- more in the fashion of a James Bond type. But Tarantino and Thurman decided that the character should be more action-oriented.

After all, he would eventually have to have a showdown with The Bride, and he needed to be able to hold his own in a battle. So, they made him more of a samurai type instead, with Beatty eventually dropping out of the role, accordingly. Before he left, though, he had a suggestion: why not cast his old friend David Carradine?

Tarantino, who grew up loving the television show Kung Fu, in which Carradine starred, loved the idea, and rewrote the script yet again to better suit the actor. Carradine has since gone on to say that it was the best role he ever had. Other actors considered include Kevin Costner, Jack Nicholson, Mickey Rourke, Burt Reynolds, and a star QT would eventually work with in his next film: Kurt Russell. In fact, it was Russell that told QT the story about his thumb-sucking at the sight of Marilyn Monroe as a kid when he saw one of her movies, which QT changed around a bit and incorporated into Volume Two.

That wasn't the only change along the way, as QT realized early on that the script was way too long and started cutting things out left and right. Among the plot points that bit the dust: the character of GoGo having a twin sister that comes after the Bride for revenge for killing her sister and is eventually killed by her; and an assassination attempt on The Bride's life by Elle Driver, who blows up the famed "Pussy Wagon," but fails to kill her.

There were also two other scenes that were shot but later taken out of the film: one, another anime-type sequence that, to the best of my knowledge, has yet to see the light of day, even in the so-called "The Whole Bloody Affair" cut that gives this review its title; the other, which is included as a bonus feature on Volume Two, is a nifty little scene in which we get to see Bill in action, taking out a gang of street toughs that want revenge for his having killed their boss. Michael Jai White, of Spawn fame, plays the leader of the crew. It's a fun scene, but tonally not right for the movie, so it's probably just as well QT cut it. It's worth a look, though, and you can see it here.

For his cinematographer, Tarantino also decided to go in a different direction. For his first two films, he had used Polish cinematographer Andrzej Sekuła, while for Jackie, he had used the Mexican cinematographer Guillermo Navarro, best-known for his work with Guillermo Del Toro (he won the Oscar for Pan's Labyrinth) and QT pal Robert Rodriguez, notably for the Tarantino-scripted From Dusk till Dawn. 

For this film, though, he wanted someone more willing to experiment. While not a huge fan of what director Oliver Stone had done in general to his script for Natural Born Killers, QT did love one aspect of the film: its cinematography. He's not alone in that assessment- for many critics, that was the best aspect of the entire film. To that end, QT drafted cinematographer Robert Richardson, who had shot most of Stone's films to date, as well as Scorsese's Casino. 


Though it would prove to be a fruitful collaboration, with Richardson going on to shoot all of Tarantino's future films- with the exception of Death Proof, which Tarantino shot himself- much like NBK, which nearly drove Richardson over the edge completely, Kill Bill would also prove to be a taxing experience. The infamous "House of Blue Leaves" sequence alone took eight grueling weeks to shoot. The entire film, Volumes One and Two, would take 155 days to shoot in all- almost half a year- and use over 450 gallons of blood! 





It was certainly not a bed of roses on the set, all around. As has been documented in more recent years, QT had Thurman do a driving stunt she didn't want to do that nearly turned deadly. (It's the bit where The Bride drives wildly to her final destination, Bill's location.) Though Tarantino was certainly apologetic and the two have since made up, it was a black mark on their friendship for years to come, not helped by the fact that he didn't fight harder for her to get a hold of the footage of the wreck, to prove her case in court.



It seems that Harvey Weinstein had possession of the footage, and refused to release it to her unless she signed a contract that would release him and his company from any liability, which she understandably refused to do, as that was sort of the point. Years later, when Weinstein was charged with multiple cases of sexual assault- Thurman being one of those who came forward- Tarantino was able to get a hold of the footage for her at long last and she was able to post it online and share her ordeal with the public.

In addition, Thurman and co-star Daryl Hannah reportedly hated each other to such an extent that, when they were nominated for Best Fight for Volume Two at the MTV Movie Awards, Thurman refused to attend, even though she had attended the previous year for Volume One. Thurman won both times, but only Hannah showed up for the second win.

They also made sure they didn't have to interact with each other altogether on the various press tours for the films, and had separate "areas" made for them at the after-party for the film's screening at Cannes to ensure they didn't have to interact there, either. Yikes!

Ironically enough, it was producer Harvey Weinstein that suggested that the film should be separated into two parts. I say ironically because Weinstein was notorious for taking films and re-editing them without the director's permission, often cutting them down radically to shorter running times, so that the films could play at more times in theaters, thus increasingly their potential profitability. (Longer films play less in theaters because there are fewer time slots for them than for shorter films.)

Tarantino was fully onboard with this approach, as he felt that it would dull the effect of the film if audiences had to sit there for over three-and-a-half hours, even with an intermission. He also realized stuff that he wouldn't have included otherwise would be able to remain in the film with it being divided into two separate films, such as the anime sequence. By separating the film into two parts, he was able to give the first part more of an action movie vibe, while the second part is mostly dedicated to character development. 

Then, once the audience had seen both parts, they could later go back and re-watch them both in tandem, this time with the knowledge of the characters that they didn't have the first time around, and it would be like a completely different experience. This holds up, in my estimation, as, for the first time, I watched the whole shebang in one long sitting, whereas before I had always either watched them on consecutive nights or with a long break in-between, and it was indeed a more comprehensive, rewarding experience.

I also watched the uncensored Asian cuts of the films, which features more violence, and no black-and-white shots in the "House of Blue Leaves" sequence. These B&W sequences were intentionally put into the American version so as to avoid getting an "X" rating. Also, in the so-called "Whole Bloody Affair" version, the scene with The Bride in B&W talking directly to the camera that opens up the second film is omitted, with the previous installment going into the second one with only a brief intermission and then immediately going into the next chapter (Chapter 6) afterwards. 

It also drops the revelation that The Bride's child is still alive at the end of the first volume, making for a slightly different experience emotionally for the viewer, as we don't find out BB is alive until Beatrix does at the end, giving the scene more impact. Obviously, this would be more impactful for the viewer seeing this film for the first time, but if you didn't know that, then it would make for a completely different experience.

Especially as viewers who saw it in its original form ended up having to wait about six months until the revelation was resolved, and then it became a situation where we knew something The Bride didn't know, as opposed to a shocker we discovered at the same time as she did. (For more on the differences between the two versions of the film, see here.)

The first time I saw the film was a lot of fun, to be sure. The electricity that had been in the air for that magical second screening of Pulp Fiction (detailed here) had returned in full force, and you could feel how much fun the audience was having. The vibe for the second film was admittedly more contained, but that's because it's a different type of film.

I will admit to being slightly underwhelmed by Volume Two the first time around, much like Jackie Brown (detailed here), but, like that film, the overall experience was much better the second time around, when I was able to watch the films consecutively. When Volume Two came out, the DVD of Volume One was just released the week before, and I hadn't been able to purchase it until after I saw Volume Two, so I was completely going by memory when I saw it for the first time.

Now that I'm used to seeing both films in tandem, and after having watched them both back-to-back in their uncensored  forms for the purposes of this review, I can honestly say that, though Volume Two may lack the balls-to-the-wall action of Volume Two, what it lacks in action, it more than makes up for in exposition, which helps deepen the characters in retrospect.

If you didn't have Volume Two, in other words, the movies as a whole wouldn't land as hard as they do. If anything, watching the two back-to-back almost made me want to watch the first installment again, with the knowledge I had firmly in mind on the re-watch. I didn't, but the fact that it made me want to is saying something, after watching nearly four hours of movies!

One of the crucial elements of the film is definitely the casting. I could get a whole new article on that element alone, so for our purposes, let's look at the new recruits to the QT family, skipping those we've already discussed, like Thurman and Michaels Madsen, Bowen and Parks (who impressively does double duty as both Esteban Vihaio and Earl McGraw, a character he also played in From Dusk till Dawn- that's also his real son playing his son, as seen above), as fantastic as they all are.

Instead, let's focus in on the fantastic Asian cast first, beginning with the remarkable Lucy Liu. Tarantino saw her in the movie Shanghai Noon and was so taken with her he completely rewrote the Japanese character to make her part Chinese and American, which led to the fantastic show-stopping moment where she cuts off the head of a temperamental complainer at a meeting to celebrate her being accepted into the fold of a crime family and goes on a rant about the consequences for bringing up her mixed background as a negative from there on out. (Note to Hollywood, now THIS is how you deal with casting an actor of a different heritage in a part- just change it to accommodate them. Duh.)

Fun personal fact: I took several acting classes in film school, and in one of them, we had to pick several monologues to do as our final exercises for a grade. I picked Liu's scene and Gary Oldman's in True Romance. It was a lot of fun practicing and learning the two scenes, I must say, and I get why actors love Tarantino so much. That is some fun dialogue to say out loud, if a bit tricky to recite well. I still have the footage somewhere, though God knows how terrible it is- an actor I am not, lol. 😕

Anyway, back to Liu. She was actually born in New York to Chinese parents. She speaks Mandarin and started learning English at five years old. She also took on martial arts as a hobby as a child, with an emphasis on weapons training with sticks, knives and other bladed weapons. Obviously, this would all come in handy for the Kill Bill movies.

She started acting around 19, and worked extensively in TV for a while, landing roles in shows like L.A. Law, Hercules, The X-Files and ER, before gaining major success with a main role on the popular show Ally McBeal, which was created especially for her after a wow-inducing audition for what ended up being Portia De Rossi's role. 

She hit the big-screen big-time with Charlie's Angels in 2000 and the subsequent sequel a few years later. She's worked steadily ever since, notably as Dr. Joan Watson on TV's Sherlock Holmes-inspired Elementary, directing several episodes of the show, as well as other shows and a short film, Meena, which gained a lot of critical acclaim.  

Also of Chinese heritage is Gordon Liu, who very nearly steals the entire movie out from everyone in Volume Two, as Pai Mei, the greatest swordsman of all time, who trains Bill, Beatrix and Elle, the latter of which ultimately takes his life when he pisses her off. (Liu also has a small role as the masked Johnny Mo in Volume One, the leader of the Crazy 88's.) I get a kick out of Mei's taunts and the way he flips his beard at The Bride. When I get old, I totally want to grow one to flip at people, lol. 👴

Liu is best-known for playing the lead in the classic The 36th Chamber of Shaolin. Other notable roles include Challenge of the Masters, Executioners from Shaolin, Dirty Ho, Clan of the White Lotus, Return to the 36th Chamber, Shaolin and Wu Tang, The Shaolin Drunken Monk, Shaolin Warrior, Disciples of the 36th Chamber, Drunken Master III, American Shaolin, Drunken Monkey, The Man with the Iron Fists and the TV series Journey to the West. 

On the Japanese end, we have the legendary Sonny Chiba, as swordsmith Hattori Hanzoa. Chiba is a longtime favorite of Tarantino's, best-known for his role in the Street Fighter series, which True Romance fans will recall playing a significant part in that film- it was at a theater showing a triple feature of the films that Clarence first met Alabama.
The Street Fighter films made Chiba an international star, and he would be the biggest name in Japanese martial arts films for the following two decades. (Bruce Lee, who reportedly figures into the plot of QT's forthcoming Once Upon a Time in Hollywood, was his Chinese 70's equivalent, of course- The Bride's famous yellow suit in Volume One is a tribute to Lee, taken from the film Game of Death.)

Chiba's first martial arts driven film was Karate Kiba, aka The Bodyguard, another film that figures prominently in QT lore, as he rewrote the opening scroll in the film as the "Ezekiel 25:17" speech Samuel L. Jackson gives twice in Pulp Fiction. In addition, the theme song from the New Battles Without Honor or Humanity, which figure prominently in the ads for Kill Bill and in the "House of Blue Leaves" sequence, is a spin-off/reboot of Battles Without Honor or Humanity, a film series that Chiba also starred in.

Other notable credits include The Executioner, Killing Machine, The Bullet Train, Champions of Death, Karate Bearfighter, Dragon Princess, Karate Warriors, Karate for Life, Doberman Cop, Shogun's Samurai: The Yagyu Conspiracy (a song from this is also featured in Kill Bill, at the end when The Bride is talking to Sophie), The Resurrection of Golden Wolf, GI Samurai, Shadow Warriors (and the sequels), Virus, The Bushido Blade, Legend of the Eight Samurai, Fighting Fist, Iron Eagle III, The Triple Cross, Immortal Combat, The Storm Riders, Deadly Outlaw: Rekka, Battle Royale II, The Fast and the Furious: Tokyo Drift, Master of Thunder, Sushi Girl and the Teppen series.

Speaking of Battle Royale, Tarantino was a big fan of the original, and specifically cast Chiaki Kuriyama from that film as GoGo. The name GoGo is a nod to the famed cartoon character Speed Racer, as in "Go Speed Racer Go!" Kuriyama is also in Ju-On: The Curse (part of the series that inspired the American Grudge series), Multiple Personality Detective Psycho, Mail, Last Quarter, Azumi II, Into the Sun, Kids (not the one you're thinking of), The Vulture, Neck, Library Wars, The Last Mission, Blade of the Immortal, and, most recently, on the Asian TV series CSI: Crime Scene Talks. 

Also worth a mention is Sakichi Sato, who played the waiter at the House of Blue Leaves in the yellow outfit with jagged stripes, aka "Charlie Brown." Sato is also a screenwriter known for adapting some of the wildest manga ever, including Takashi Miike's Gozu and Ichi the Killer. He also acted in both films as well. He made his directorial debut with the film Tokyo Zombie, yet another manga adaptation. He's also directed the colorfully-titled Insect Detective Yoshimi Yoshida, Miss Boys and, most recently, Tokyo Slaves. 

Moving on to the Deadly International Viper Assassination Squad, aka the "DIVAS," in addition to Carradine, Liu and Madsen, there's also Daryl Hannah, as Elle Driver. Hannah started out working with QT fave Brian De Palma in The Fury- the film pays homage to him in a Dressed to Kill-inspired split screen sequence with Elle in the hospital early on in Volume One. 

After that, she made her first big impression on viewers in the classic Blade Runner (see my review here), which this film also pays homage to, in the sequence after The Bride lands in Tokyo and is riding her motorcycle- the tunnel that leads into the city is one in the same from the film, but it's actually located in LA, with Japanese signage added. Hannah then made a Splash as a mermaid in Ron Howard's popular film, which was also one of star Tom Hanks' first big hits.  

Other notable credits include Skinemax fave Summer Lovers, The Final Terror, Reckless, The Pope of Greenwich Village, The Clan of the Cave Bear, Roxanne, Wall Street, Steel Magnolias, Grumpy Old Men, The Little Rascals, The Tie That Binds, The Gingerbread Man, Dancing at the Blue Iguana, A Walk to Remember, The Job, Whore, Vice (also with Michael Madsen), Eldorado (with both Madsen and Carradine), I Am Michael and the TV movie Attack of the 50-Foot Woman. She was also in the recent Wachowskis' Netflix series Sense8. 

Rounding out the squad is Vivica A. Fox, who plays Vernita Green. Fox made her motion picture debut in Oliver Stone's Born on the Fourth of July. She was also in the ground-breaking TV show Generations, the first soap opera to focus on an African-American family. After a lot of guest spots on popular TV shows like The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air, Family Matters and Martin, she returned to the big screen in a big way in the massive hit, Independence Day.

Other notable roles include: Set it Off, Booty Call, Soul Food, Batman & Robin, Why Do Fools Fall in Love?, Two Can Play That Game (and the sequel), Idle Hands, Teaching Mrs. Tingle, Kingdom Come, Hendrix, Ella Enchanted and a recurring role in the Sharknado series.

There's also the DIVAS-adjacent Sofie Fatale, played by Julie Dreyfus, who is among the few to make it out alive, albeit minus a few limbs. (Elle, too, possibly lives, albeit minus both eyes and trapped in an RV with a deadly snake she put there, so...?) I think Sofie only lost one in the original, but in the uncensored version, she loses another arm in the trunk, after talking back to Beatrix, before she unceremoniously  dumps her down a hill to a hospital. 

Dreyfus is a French actress fluent in Japanese (and French and English, of course), which is a big reason she got the role. She is quite popular in Japan, in part because of serving as a judge on Iron Chef. Other films include Rampo, A Feast at Midnight, Legal Aliens, The Godson, Bathory, Tokyo!, Vinyan, Interpol and episodes of the TV series The Crow: Stairway to Heaven, inspired by the movie and comic book of the same name. She also worked with QT again in Inglourious Basterds. 

Other notable cast members include: Bo Svenson (the Walking Tall series, Wizards of the Lost Kingdom- he would also crop up in Basterds- fitting, as he was also in the original 70's Inglorious Bastards) as the ill-fated preacher that is set to marry The Bride; and Jeannie Epper (Foxy Brown, Switchblade Sisters) as the preacher's wife- she's a longtime stunt-woman considered one of the greats, that was featured alongside Zoë Bell, aka Uma Thurman's stunt double, in the cool documentary Double Dare (about stunt-women).

Veteran character actor Larry Bishop plays Larry Gomez, Budd's boss at the strip club, where Sid Haig (Jackie Brown, House of 1000 Corpses) also crops up as a bartender. Bishop was the brother of Rat Pack-er Joey, and was in lots of 70's TV (Laverne and Shirley, I Dream of Jeannie, Barney Miller, etc.).

Other notable credits include: Wild in the Streets, The Savage Seven, The Devil's 8, Angel Unchained, Chrome and Hot Leather (alongside singer Marvin Gaye!), Soul Hustler, Shanks (a weird one, it sometimes crops up on TCM), The Big Fix, C.H.O.M.P.S., The Sting II, Underworld (not the one with vampires), Mad Dog Time and Hell Ride, which he also wrote and directed and which was "presented" by Quentin Tarantino, and co-stars Madsen and Carradine, with whom he also appeared on the show Kung Fu.

Finally, I would be remiss to not mention the potential next generation of assassins, Ambrosia Kelley and Perla Haney-Jardine, as, respectively, Nikki Bell, Vernita's daughter, who witnesses Beatrix kill her mother; and BB, Beatrix's daughter, who she doesn't know exists until the very end of the film. There has been much speculation about there potentially being a Kill Bill, Volume Three, revolving around these two characters, which could also potentially be recast, if need be.

It might also be a way for QT to sidestep the whole "I'm only doing ten movies and I'm done" thing. After all, it would technically be part of the same series, and he only counted the two Kill Bill movies as one big movie. Either way, both of the original actresses are pretty much at the right age to do it already. Kelley is 24, and Haney-Jardine is 22. 

Admittedly, neither have done a whole lot since. Kelley did a fair amount of TV, plus the movies This Christmas and Stacy's Mom (hopefully not inspired by the song, lol), while Jardine has fared slightly better, movie-wise, with roles in Dark Water, Spider-Man 3, Untraceable, Steve Jobs (she played the teen version of Jobs' daughter) and her most recent film, 2017's Midnighters. Kelley's last credit was in 2012, by comparison. 

So, recasting the roles with better-known actresses is certainly a possibility, and maybe even a probability. There's quite a bit of online fan support for Maya Hawke, Uma's daughter with Ethan Hawke, to take over the BB role. It's worth mentioning that Maya Hawke is really talented and does indeed look a good bit like her mom, so... totally doable there. (In more ways than one... 😉)

She is currently winning fans over in the third season of Stranger Things, and has a small role in QT's latest, Once Upon a Time in Hollywood, so, in a way, she's already got a leg up on the competition. (Or perhaps a foot, in Tarantino's case, lol. 😜)

For Nikki, might I suggest Amandla Stenberg? She was totally fierce in The Hate U Give and she's done a bit of action in The Hunger Games and The Darkest Minds. She also has just enough of a resemblance to Fox (or to Kelley, for that matter) to pass as her daughter.


Either way, presuming QT could come up with something interesting beyond simply Nikki goes after Beatrix, maybe kills her and then her daughter seeks revenge, it could be interesting. Perhaps Nikki could get an assist from Elle Driver, now a blind swordswoman (it sounds ridiculous, but it's been done in both Eastern films- i.e. the Zatoichi series- and even American ones- Blind Fury, anyone?). Maybe we also find out that some of the others who died also had kids, and there's a revenge free-for-all? Either way, I'm there if he does it.

Kill Bill was an enormous hit that put Tarantino back on top, coming within spitting distance of Pulp Fiction numbers (which grossed well over $200 million) at the box office. Volume One grossed $180 million on a $30 million budget, while Volume Two grossed $152 million on a $25 million budget. As both films were shot back-to-back, it cost $55 million for both films, so taken together (and Tarantino does consider them one movie), they did outgross Pulp.

Whatever the case, fans loved the films, and they went a long way towards rectifying Tarantino's reputation, in light of the mixed reception for Jackie Brown. While he wouldn't release another film until 2007's Grindhouse project, his success here certainly restored everyone's faith in the director, though critics never really lost it in the first place. But would it last?

Join me next time for a quick look at Tarantino's next foray into commercial television, his two-part storyline for CSI, entitled "Grave Danger." As you will see, and some of you already know, the plotline shares a few things with part of the storyline of Kill Bill, Volume Two. See you then! 😎