Director: Quentin Tarantino
Cast: Uma Thurman, Lucy Liu, Vivica A. Fox, Sonny Chiba
Have I Seen it Before: I wouldn’t say kung fu movies are a mainstay in my movie watching diet, so the prospect of this one didn’t insist on itself way-back-when. On spec, it was the film which inspired every brain-dead fool on my dorm floor to buy and display cheap samurai swords. Taken solely as the sum total of its parts the film should be irritating. And yet, I can’t recall a movie winning me over faster than when this one mentioned an old Klingon proverb in its opening seconds.
Did I Like It: That last remark I made really should say it all. Is there anyone who can bake together disparate parts that might not have been very good on their own—and certainly have no business going together—into a package so ceaselessly entertaining? The unflinching violence of the fights—which, surely, may not be to everyones taste—is one thing, but I’m really here for the little things. How can one not like a movie that injects a club owner who looks like Charlie Brown just for the joy of it?
And this isn’t even a complete movie, just the flashier parts Miramax would let Tarantino put forward, before the more introspective and emotional Kill Bill — Volume 2 (2004). It jumps around—hardly new for Tarantino—offers no real sense of catharsis at the end, and only holds itself together through the use of voice over narration. Honestly, if any other filmmaker had handled the same material or themes, the end result would have been the most irritating movie of all time.
Maybe I need to give all of these things another chance. I look at the Origin of O-Ren and wonder if I’ve been spending my whole life being wrong about Anime. For my money, that takeaway—the desire to steep oneself in the ingredients Tarantino has used—is the best possible feeling after one of his movies. That he has me even marginally interested in anime is a feat at which decades worth of friends have steadfastly failed.