LB: Second Opening Analysis: Kill Bill Volume 1 (Tarantino, 2003)

Kill Bill was an iconic film produced in 2003 by Tarantino to be his highly anticipated 4^th film. Due to its structure, Kill Bill is viewed by many as a culmination of various genres, how I found it interesting in the way the Tarantino had chosen to produce the film and represent the story.


Film Language:

The first area I shall be analysing is the Film Language. In this sequence for instance, mise-en-scene is a key factor in drawing the audience’s attention towards the film. Firstly, we begin by seeing a woman lying on the floor who we are yet to know, but nonetheless she is covered in blood, which initially suggests pain and suffering.  The next section of mise-en-scene is costume, where we see this woman is dressed in a Brides gown furthermore creating questions in the mind of the viewer, and as well as this non-verbal language is another main point I wish to address. The audience are shown this woman through a CU which enables Tarantino to represent the female as fearful and distressed as the audience can see detailed emotion furthermore reinforce via non-verbal language such as heavy, deep breathing, as well as shivering.

In the sequence, although only two shots are used, the audience build up a vast representation through other techniques however the two used both CU, the first being the shot of the woman’s head so that the audience can be position with her as well as give her prevalence over any other character, but is also used to show her emotion. The second is also a CU on a pair of walking boots; this enables the identity of ‘Bill’ to remain hidden yet the audience already understand who the culprit is. And lastly, both shots show who in this sequence has power and control as the audience are positioned above the female character, but below the male character.

The next area that is vital is sound for instance when we see bills footsteps, we hear them throughout the sound as deep thuds which suggest both power and authority. As well as this, the  is evident use of a sound bridge from which we see the woman’s reaction however we hear the dialogue of thee man thus his identity remains hidden. And through this dialogue which he states “Do you find me sadistic?” which suggest to the audience that as he is asking questions about himself, he look very highly upon himself and that he may be rather arrogant or aggressive, which is common in films such as The Godfather (Cappola, 1972) or Analyze This (Ramis, 1999) both featuring mafia type characters.

Finally, Tarantino has chose to film the opening sequence in black and white which is iconic of film noir for which it was common for identities to remain hidden through the use of low key lighting or silhouettes.

Institutional Context:

Kill Bill uses some well known actors such as Uma Thurman, ‘The Bride’, for whom she has been cast in many dramas previously, as well as another well known actress Lucy Liu, ‘O-Ren Ishii’, who has featured in such films as Charlie’s Angels (McGinty Nichol, 2000), Lucky Number Slevin (McGuigan, 2006) and Kung Fu Panda(Osborne, 2008).

The studio behind Kill Bill was A Band Apart and was distributed by Miramax films. A Band Apart was founded by both Tarantino and Lawrence Bender in 1991 and operated until 2006. As a result, Kill Bill is an industrial production on a budget of $55 million because at the time of production, Miramax was owned by Walt Disney, one of the six majors.  Miramax had a lot of faith in the film and therefore as the internet was growing, they put large sums into the interactive portion of the marketing campaign.  The majority of the marketing had been handed over to an external company, Deep Focus, a digital marketing company founded in 2002.