Zacharek in salon says: "With the exception of a lovely, muted section
in which the Bride travels to Okinawa to beg the craftsman and
swordmaster Hattori Hanzo (Chiba, who brings so much warmth and humanity
to his role that you wish the movie gave us more of him) to make a
spectacular weapon for her, "Kill Bill" feels much too taken with its
own hip vision."
Flaxman just wrote; "And as for the
> characters, I can't say I found any of them really interesting or
> humanized,"
Khazeni just said: "I'm not sure sympathy is the right word.
> But
> > it is a "humanization" of figures who essentially are like comic
book
> > figures. I think the audience's rapport with the characters is
cemented
> by
> > Tarantino's manipulation of genre."
I'm not sure exactly what it means to humanize a character, if that's a
goal of KB, and if it an appropriate metric of evaluation.
KB is an homage to action films, it's around a revenge plot, and it
involves exaggerated, unrealistic displays violence in comic excess.
What kind of humanization should we expect?
The goal of KB seems to be to achieve a certain kind of visceral effect
by emulating the best techniques in the tradition it references. I
can't help thinking that the talk of humanized characters is somewhat
off target. Yes, parts of it take place in Tokyo, but it is not
supposed to be "Lost in Translation." It's a different kind of movie.
Aaron
|