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Compiled by: Jack Foley
WITH only one week to go before the UK release of Quentin Tarantino's
keenly-anticipated Kill Bill conclusion, it seems appropriate
to check out how it fared with US critics when it opened in the
States on April 16.
Needless to say, the word was almost overwhelmingly positive.
The New York Times leads the way by stating that 'Quentin
Tarantino's deliciously perverse semisequel is the most voluptuous
comic-book movie ever made'.
While CNN referred to it as 'a rip-roaring, highly entertaining,
extremely enjoyable continuation to Vol.
1'.
The Los Angeles Times declared it, simply, to be 'a blast
of pure pop pleasure', while Village Voice declared that
'Tarantino elevates Uma Thurman into the action-flick firmament
- she's the lethal Marlene Dietrich projected by his geek Josef
von Sternberg'.
And the Hollywood Reporter felt that 'here's a movie that
both academics bundled in film theories and teenagers on hot dates
will find supercool'.
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USA Today, meanwhile, wrote that 'Kill Bill's two-pack
isn't of Godfather caliber ... [b]ut its scope, filmmaking ambition
and uniquely twisted point of view make it worthy of being seen
some day in a chronological home version'.
And Entertainment Weekly opined: "With the second
installment, Tarantino - famous as an inspired manipulator of
genre, less proven as a filmmaker of soul - shows his shy but
ardent, cinephiliac understanding of American sentiment and yearning."
Still positive were Ebert and Roeper, who described it
as 'a beautiful, twisted, complex martial arts soap opera'.
While Rolling Stone predicted that 'you'll thrill to the
action, savor the tasty dialogue and laugh like bloody hell'.
Slant Magazine wrote that 'aside from the films’
contrary ambiences — which we might term excess vs. focus
— this principle of twos reveals itself in Tarantino’s
casting'.
And the Arizona Daily Star raved that it 'kicks down the
door with a primal scream, sticks up the cash register and holds
moviegoers hostage'.
The Minneapolis Star Tribune, meanwhile, wrote that 'Kill
Bill, Vol. 2 is every bit as wild a joyride as its prelude, but
packed with richer, more resonant characters'.
The final word, however, goes to Variety, which concluded:
"What Quentin Tarantino started with a wham he finishes with
a bang in Kill Bill Vol. 2."
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