Kill Bill is one of my very favorite movies, and I recently rewatched both volumes. I have nothing negative to say about either of them. So what I decided to do was to rank each of the action scenes. This is my rewatch review. Chapter times are in the description if you want to jump to any particular fight.
Kill Bill Volumes 1 and 2 were released October of 2003 and April of 2004, and both were written and directed by the talented Quentin Tarantino and were his fourth and fifth releases. If you wanted to watch these right now, I think you’d have to buy or rent them from your favorite service, like Apple TV Plus or prime video. I wasn’t able to find them available to stream at the time of this recording, but I’m sure they’re somewhere and I was missing it. So if you just happen to know, maybe leave that information in the comments for everyone else.
Bonus: Deleted Scene Bill vs Samurai Henchmen
Okay. So I happened to watch these on my Blu ray, which you might see up around there somewhere. In the volume two disc it features a fight between Bill and a bunch of henchmen, and I totally forgot about this scene. So this is the honorable mention. I thought it was dope that it features Michael Jai White I forgot he was even in that!
And it mostly features Bill kicking ass and being real laid back while the Bride watches. I think they shot it to establish Bill as a skilled fighter at the same level as what we’ve seen of the bride so far. And to give a little bit of their backstory. I see why it was cut from the film, though it didn’t quite have the same esthetic as the rest of the movie, and it was just a little bit hokey.
Jai White’s character had his vocals dubbed while his mouth was moving in a different way to kind of pay homage to the martial arts movies that Tarantino, was definitely inspired by while making these, but that part was a little bit weird because none of the other scenes in the movie did anything similar to that.
6: The Bride Vs California Mountain Snake/Elle Driver
So I know I have this one ranked kind of low, but it was actually really kind of crazy. After Elle Kills Bud via cleverly placed black mamba snake while giving us a lovely monologue about their deadliness, we get our fight between her and the Bride. She gets a jar of chewing tobacco spit tossed in her face, she gets swirly in the toilet.GROSS! She really had a tough time in this fight. I love how Tarantino subverted expectations in this fight. We thought we were about to get an epic Hanzo sword versus Hanzo sword duel, but instead we see her get her good eye plucked right out. The camerawork was really cool leading up to it happening. He zooms in on both characters eyes and them making eye contact before that happens.
She got just what she deserved, especially after Killing Pai Mei. She seemed like the most purely evil out of all the Deadly Vipers. So it was a little gratifying seeing her go out that way.
5: Pai Mei Training
Who doesn’t like a good training montage? The one with Pai Mei in volume two is right up there with the best of em. You see the Bride honing her skills under his cruel tutelage. I loved his judgmental beard flicks. All this to show how she became so bad ass and to help us buy into her punching her way out of being buried alive. I was sold!
4: The Bride Vs Bill
This scene was great because of all the buildup throughout both movies and in the scene itself, we see the Bride discover that her daughter survived, so she has a lot more to live for then vengeance now. This fight was such a slow burn. So much dialog and exposition. I never thought they would get to it. I loved his Superman analogy and the mini pregnancy test scene in between was nice. She used the Five Point Exploding Heart Technique to get the job done. Apparently this move didn’t originate in this movie, but with the character of Pi Mae in another movie. I read that the character of Pai Mei has been around for a really long time in various films played by numerous different actors. I couldn’t imagine a cooler way to kill Bill.
3: The Bride vs Copperhead/Vernita Green
This scene starts things off with a bang and got right down to business. It was on site when these two saw each other. A knife fight is Up close and personal and their beef was very personal. Man, they destroyed that house. Having the daughter show up was a really cool twist.
The only thing that seemed off to me about this scene was at the end with Vivica Fox, her character, missed her shot. She’s a trained assassin. How could she miss? But I guess that would have killed the story. So things kind of had to go down the way they did.
TARANTINO, Quentin, can we please get that third movie that you teased here with the daughter coming back for the bride? It’s time now.
2: The Bride vs Cottonmouth/O-Ren Ishii
This scene was the perfect contrast to the one with the crazy 88. We join the Bride and O-ren Ishii in this Winter Courtyard that was totally different from where they had just come from. The scene is way more calm and meditative despite the battle that is about to take place. The respect that we see that O-ren has for Hanzo swords really built them up for the next volume.
The only thing I really didn’t like was the music choice once that kicked in, but I was glad it didn’t stay too long because it was just a little bit distracting. And then that final moment where she gets scalped. Ouch. Perfect way to end Volume one. And she was definitely the coolest of the Deadly Vipers.
1: The Bride vs Crazy 88 and Gogo
And I can’t imagine enjoying the action scene more than I did this one. They had to turn in black and white just to keep the R-rating instead of getting both that NC 17. It was brutal but had a perfect amount of levity throughout. There was a moment where the bride was kind of breakdancing on the ground and cutting people’s ankles off that. I don’t know if I ever noticed that before. Then the moment where they flipped the switch to make things kind of silhouetted, it was really cool too.
And then they opened up to the whole room and it’s just all these people laying on the ground, just writhing in pain. Even the pool is red with all of their blood. And it added to the context of how much damage she did to this group of fighters.
I can’t forget about Gogo with her Mace. That part of the battle was pretty intense and brutal. Perfect weapon for that character and gnarly death for her to.
The Verdict
So rewatching these just reminded me why I love these movies so much. Martial arts movies were a first love of mine and this was an innovative addition to the bunch and even surpassed some of my prior favorites. With Tarantino at the helm it has so much style. It pays homage to the best of the aforementioned genre, as well as spaghetti westerns, blaxploitation movies, grindhouse films, and even anime. These movies hold up and are exceptionally.
So what did you think of Kill Bill? What are your favorite fight scenes and moments? And which movie should I rewatch next? Let me know in the comments.
