KILL BILL: THE WHOLE BLOODY AFFAIR Review: Cycles and Consequences

Finally! Reunited, and it feels so good.

Kill Bill: The Whole Bloody Affair
The film opens December 5, only in theaters, via Lionsgate. Visit Fandango for locations and showtimes.

Even better together, Kill Bill: The Whole Bloody Affair reconfirms Quentin Tarantino as the Ultimate Cinematic Mixmaster, borrowing from every movie he's ever seen, putting everything in a blender, and making something altogether new. It's a truly epic piece of filmmaking, masterfully accomplished.

Rumored since the original theatrical release of Kill Bill: Vol. 2 in April 2004, the single-film version premiered at the Cannes Film Festival in May 2006 and has been exhibited since then only in extremely limited engagements over the years. I saw both volumes during their original theatrical releases -- separated by six months -- as well as individually multiple times, even watching them back to back, but they've always felt like conjoined twins after they were separated.

They were still bloody, and it was clear how they were related, but Vol. 1 always felt somewhat disappointing because it ended too soon, and Vol. 2 always felt like a distantly-related cousin who joined the party after it was winding down.

Now with bits and pieces restored in its unrated edition, most notably with the extension of the Production I.G. anime sequence, and with a 15-minute intermission inserted at its halfway point, Kill Bill reaches farther than ever to show that, yes, good artists copy, but great artists steal, and Quentin Tarantino is a great artist.

Having not seen either of the original movies for some years, all the narrative plot points were still in my mind, yet I realized that I did not fully appreciate all the many, many cinematic effects that the director utilizes: how he frames shots, how he moves the camera -- and what magnificent beauty captured by cinematographer Robert Richardson! -- how some scenes unfold in total quiet, with no background sounds, the selection of iconic genre music cues, the placement of those cues, how he chooses to use slow motion and freeze frames and flashbacks and zooms -- what classic Shaw Brothers zooms during the Pei Mei sequence! -- and split screens and so many great design decisions -- credit to production designers David Wasco and Yohei Taneda -- and, of course, the brilliant film editor Sally Menke.

At its heart, though, Kill Bill is all about revenge, its cycles and consequences. Pregnant when she suffered a gunshot to the head, The Bride (Uma Thurman) wakes up from a four-year coma, realizes that her child is gone, and becomes hellbent on revenge.

Obviously, the titular Bill (David Carradine) must die, because he is the one who shot her, as we see in the opening minute of the film. But The Bride also holds her former fellow members of the Deadly Viper Asssassination Squad (hired killers, led by Bill) responsible for their actions. When she deals with Vernita Green (Vivica A. Fox), she acknowledges that Vernita's daughter may some day come looking for her in order to exact revenge.

When The Bride encounters O-Ren Ishii (Lucy Liu), we learn through an extended anime sequence that O-Ren has exacted revenge against those who wronged her. The revenge theme is furthered with The Bride's encounters with Bill's brother, Budd (Michael Madsen), the one-eyed Elle Driver (Daryl Hannah), and Bill himself.

Sometimes the DVAS members themselves acknowledge that The Bride is fully entitled to take revenge. Mostly, they focus on their need to kill her, and feel fully justified in doing so. How do they live with themselves, having killed people around the globe for many years? Mostly, they live very well, and have no pangs of conscience. They did what they did.

"Forget about the past," one character says, late in the movie. Try as she might, The Bride cannot forget what happened. She must do what she came to do. If she survives, she will keep on keeping on. Because that's what Quentin Tarantino's characters do: they try to survive the whole bloody affair, so they can keep on living.