Coming into the new century, Quentin Tarantino was riding high. His then self-titled trilogy of Reservoir Dogs, Pulp Fiction and Jackie Brown had shook up the movie industry, popularising non-chronological narratives and pop cultural discussions, as well as spawning a barrage of imitators. And then he did Kill Bill. Split in two because he couldn't find a feasible way to make it work as a single movie, it contains many of the overarching problems people seem to have with Tarantino's films; an over-the-top obsession with violence, conventional cool over depth and, most importantly, a refusal to edit the films down to a concise length. There are similar problems with the director's other noughties movie, the aimless (and purposely so) Death Proof, but Kill Bill remains more divisive thanks to the promise it managed to still show. Vol. 1 was treated mostly positively thanks to a kinetic approach to action and the promise of narrative resolution in the second part. And it's that expectation that really hurt Vol. 2; we do indeed get to see the Bride kill Bill (unless the lack of name cross-out in the credits indicates his survival), but to get there is a bewilderingly talky and meandering path, which wasn't what his fans really wanted.
