Kill Bill (Quentin Tarantino, 2003) is the fourth film by the renowned contemporary American director Quentin Tarantino. It is his first movie where women take on leading roles, particularly The Bride (Uma Thurman) in a male-dominated film genres,like Western, action and thriller. This is a significant departure from his previous works, notably highlighted in a scene between Vance (John Travolta) and Mia (Uma Thurman) in a restaurant in 'Pulp Fiction.' In his debut film, 'Reservoir Dogs' (1992), women are absent. 'Pulp Fiction' (1994) and Jackie Brown (1997), they predominantly occupy secondary roles as romantic pairs or femme fatales. These patterns persist throughout his subsequent works, often depicting women as victims of the director's male gaze, a point that has been publicly acknowledged his podophilia. However, in 'Once Upon a Time...in Hollywood' (2019), Sharon Tate (Margot Robbie) assumes the role of a MacGuffin, and her character and the events surrounding her become integral to the film's storytelling.
It is worth noting the controversial and tumultuous personal and professional relationship between the director and Uma Thurman. This relationship has been compared to that of Alfred Hitchcock and Tippi Hedren. Despite both Tarantino and Uma Thurman contributing to each other's fame and financial success, it is essential to acknowledge a distressing incident. During the filming of 'Kill Bill,' Tarantino encouraged Uma Thurman to perform a stunt, resulting in a severe accident. This accident left her with permanent neck damage, a concussion, and knee injuries.
Over these 20 years, Kill Bill maintains Quentin Tarantino's trademark style, featuring bloody sequences, extreme violence, car trunk shots from low angles, and a non-linear narrative. However, the film distinguishes itself from the director's other works in several ways. It draws inspiration from the Japanese thriller Lady Snowblood (Toshiya Fujita, 1973) and openly references Japanese cinema with intertextual parallel scenes. 'Kill Bill' also pays homage to Japanese culture through its use of anime aesthetics, extreme close-ups, swords, and choreographed martial arts fights featuring exaggerated sound effects.
Kill Bill showcases diversity and intersectionality, portraying women from various backgrounds in powerful roles, even when those roles align with societal expectations of women in pink-collar jobs like nurses, brides, housewives, or mothers. In the movie, Cottonmouth (Ai Maeda) is portrayed as being of both Chinese and Japanese heritage. While this representation may be seen as an attempt to capture the complexity of her background, it could also be viewed as a somewhat simplistic way of depicting an Asian character, as it combines two distinct countries under one umbrella. On the other hand, it could be interpreted as a portrayal of someone resulting from miscegenation. The dominant use of yellow, associated with the protagonist, holds significance of the colour in Japanese culture, symbolizing courage and bravery.
However, Kill Bill fuels female rivalry when female characters engage in combat or are assigned misogynistic codenames like 'Cottonmouth.' Notably, the film's costumes are tight and can be seen as sexualizing the characters, aligning them with the archetype of the femme fatale even if they are skilled in martial arts. The portrayal of their bodies emphasizes thinness as the beauty standard. Furthermore, the majority of weapons used by the characters are swords, which can be seen as phallic symbols that, in an ironic twist, empower the female characters even more. But there are scenes where women fight using domestic objects like knives, possibly implying the traditional societal roles assigned to women as caretakers and homemakers.
Comments