Kill Bill Vol. 1
Written and Directed by: Quentin Tarantino
Starring: Uma Thurman, Lucy Liu, Sonny Chiba, Michael Madsen, David Carradine

Quentin Tarantino is a lot smarter than people give him credit for. He has laid low for the past few years, letting the hype die down, all the while preparing to launch his next tour-de-force on the world. He certainly hasn’t gotten lazy during this break. If anything, he has only raised the bar for what he wants to accomplish with his movies.

Kill Bill is an overwhelming movie of epic proportions. You may wonder why it was divided into two volumes at the last minute, but rest assured, the movie has more than enough meat to fill two installments. As with all of Tarantino’s work, he is again paying tribute to something he loves. This time it is old kung fu movies and westerns. The idea is pretty simple — it’s all about revenge. Uma Thurman is a pregnant bride who is murdered (along with 8 other people in the wedding party) at the wedding by her husband-to-be, Bill. However, she doesn’t actually get killed, she wakes up from a coma four years later (partially paralyzed, mind you) with only one goal in mind… getting even. So she simply wills her legs into working order, and begins to track the down members of the Deadly Viper Assassination Squad. (No, this movie certainly does not strive for realism.)

The movie has a lot of the trademarks from Tarantino’s past films. I had forgotten how much controversy Reservoir Dogs and Pulp Fiction has stirred up because of their foul language and excessive violence. Kill Bill takes all of this stuff to another level, believe it or not. It is one of the bloodiest movies I have seen, although it is important to realize that it was ridiculously overdone on purpose… to the point where it becomes a source of humour. Still, one has to wonder if the black and white sequences may have been shot this way to avoid an NC-17 rating? At any rate, I guess my being ID’d 3 times on the way into the theatre was well justified.

I have to say that although Kill Bill seems more like a movie for guys just because of the copious amounts of action and fighting, I think girls will love it too. In a way, Uma Thurman is a new hero for the feminist movement. A lot of people I talk to seem to dislike Uma Thurman and I can’t figure out why. She has been in two of my all-time favourite movies (Gattaca, and of course, Taratino’s own Pulp Fiction) and all I can say is that I hope this movie brings a newfound respect for her. There’s no debating that this role must have been extremely draining both physically and emotionally, but she absolutely nails it all. It’s quite an achievement, and I hope that Quentin doesn’t steal all the credit for this movie’s brilliance.

The fight scenes in Kill Bill Vol. 1 are extraordinary, and they don’t have to rely on high tech special effects either. The choreography is handled by Yuen Wo Ping, who does pretty much every big martial arts movie as of late (including The Matrix movies), so there’s no huge surprise there. But if there was any question as to whether or not Tarantino could handle a full out action movie, let it be known that he pulls it off deftly and gracefully. Although the action slows down in the middle of the film, it all builds for a finale of gigantic proportions that undeniably upstages the “burly brawl” from The Matrix Reloaded (especially considering that none of the people you see on screen in Kill Bill were computer generated).

The movie also brings a healthy dose of Tarantino’s sharp humour. From the opening scene where an assassin’s young daughter comes home from school in the middle of a fight, to the arguments between two Japanese restaurant employees, to the disgusting hospital intern who rents out comatose patients for sex, there’s a lot of stuff guaranteed to make you laugh and/or raise your eyebrows. There’s also a certain campiness to kung fu flicks that has been very well emulated and amplified here. And for film nerds, there are probably a million other inside jokes and references that flew completely over my head. The Star Trek and other pop culture references are something that only Tarantino could throw in without being ridiculed.

Now I’m not saying there weren’t some things about this movie that bugged me. In particular, it is clear that Tarantino likes to show off maybe a little too much for his own good. Fortunately for him, he does have a great sense of style. The cinematography in this movie is a sight to behold (cinematographer Robert Richardson previously worked on such movies as Bringing Out The Dead and Natural Born Killers). The camera swoops and dives and takes in the scenes from a variety of creative angles. What’s more, no one (and I mean NO ONE) picks a better soundtrack than QT. Kill Bill has a great mix of surf, rockabilly, rock and roll, funk, and more modern sounding stuff spread throughout the film. The only thing is… did the music really have to be THAT loud? And the scene showcasing The 5678’s on stage was a little bit too drawn out. Great band, but again Tarantino was being a little too self-indulgent here.

The dialogue falls off the mark in some cases, a result of trying too hard. Similar to Kevin Smith, Tarantino ends up giving his characters unnatural sounding speech in some places because he can’t help being so damn wordy. Unlike past Tarantino screenplays however, not many moviegoers are likely to be memorizing their favourite lines from this movie, because the best lines were all spoken in Japanese and only subtitled in English.

The movie also contains a 10 minute anime sequence that tells the back story of the character O-Ren Ishii. While the sequence itself was cool, it did seem a bit out of place… another example of Tarantino showing off and doing everything he thinks is “neat” rather than what really suits the movie as a whole. But I suppose the “Tarantino generation” is used to having stuff thrown at them with multiple mediums in easily digestable bits and pieces. I just think this would have been more appropriate as a cool extra on the DVD or something to offer on the Kill Bill website.

I don’t know if the movie needed to be broken up chronologically like it was. Sure it’s part of Tarantino’s trademark now to tell a story out of order, but it seemed to me to hurt the flow of the movie. In particular, I didn’t like how each part was divided up by titled chapters. It made the movie seem longer than it actually was. More to the point though, I just wish Kill Bill could have been released as one complete movie. It’s not that I had a problem with the ending exactly, but it might have forced Tarantino to be a little more selective in his editing, giving us a tighter film. (Then again, knowing Quentin, he probably would have just unleashed the full 4 hours on us all at once.) It also would have left us with a better understanding of “The Bride”, and what happened before the tragic wedding massacre. Instead, now we must wait a few months before a lot of the blanks are filled in. Volume One just does not stand on its own very well, and if I didn’t know the next installment was already completed I would be feeling somewhat shortchanged right now.

Kill Bill Volume 1 can definitely get by on its dazzling visuals and unique style alone, but its hard to pass judgement on some of the other elements since it is an incomplete work. I can only hope that when the DVD is released it will all be combined into one package. In the meantime, Tarantino has again managed to prove himself as a dynamic and exciting director (and, yes, still a bit of a rock star too). Kill Bill Volume 1 was worth the long wait, but it’s a shame that some of the film’s potential was squandered because there was no one around to rein in Tarantino’s creativity. Ah well. I’ll still be eagerly lining up for Vol. 2 when February rolls around anyway. — Sean

ESPN NHL Hockey/Sega NHL 2K4 (X-Box)
Developed by: Kush Games
Published by: Sega

Back in the glorious days of 8 bit gaming there were a number of different hockey games available, each offering a unique take on the game. When EA introduced their NHL hockey series in 1991, however, there became only one. Other games may have existed, but they simply no longer mattered. The level of detail and play control in EA’s games blew everything else out of the water.

For a few years, EA coasted along and continued to dominate in the hockey game market.Unfortunately, when there’s no competition to constantly raise the bar, the innovation level can start to fizzle out. It’s not so much that EA stopped putting out good games, but they became reluctant to take risks and their hockey series began to stagnate. And so it came to pass that when Sega made their triumphant return to hockey last year with NHL 2K3, they were able to capitalize on some of EA’s mistakes and gain a sizeable following. Their take on electronic hockey was familiar enough to pick up and play easily, but added a more realistic simulation feel to the game that many hockey gamers had been sorely missing.

After years of buying EA’s hockey games for various systems, I finally realized that I too wanted a new perspective, so this year I invested in Sega’s ESPN NHL Hockey (NHL 2K4). Although some hardcore Sega fans are disappointed with 2K4, feeling that it is inferior to last year’s installment, I have to say that I am generally quite pleased with how this game turned out. It is the breath of fresh air that I had been looking for.

The most noticeable and most important difference for me is the play control. The last few years EA’s controls have seemed sluggish, and even after customizing settings it still seemed like goals were based more on behind the scenes probability calculations rather than skill. The stickhandling in ESPN NHL Hockey is smooth and responsive, and as a result it feels so much more rewarding when you pull off a great play to “light the lamp”. They’ve also added some cool new control features that I’ve never seen before in a hockey game. Things like board pinning, the ability to grab the puck out of the air, sidestepping, and a couple different ways of pulling off manual dekes all really add to the experience. Of course, with all these different maneuvers in mind, the control schemes take a little bit of time to learn. They have wisely provided 3 different control schemes based on a player’s skill level. Unfortunately mixing and matching these control schemes isn’t possible.

The ESPN branding turned out pretty well, although it may confuse some consumers who are shopping for the new Sega hockey game since Sega’s name isn’t very noticeable on the package. The incorporation of the ESPN theme song and transition graphics makes the game feel pretty authentic to a TV broadcast. The commentators are none other than ESPN’s Gary Thorne and Bill Clement, and their dialogue is very professional sounding and fluid while showing a surprising amount of variety. Particularly impressive are some of the specific comments regarding replays and the offhand trivia they impart regarding various players. Like all video game commentary however, some of the illusion wears off when you’ve played a few games and you start to hear the same phrases repeated over and over.

There are a lot of cool extra gimmicks that kind of got me excited about this game too. It has everything from a skills competition to an arcadey 2-on-2 pond hockey mode, to the ability to unlock old classic teams from different hockey eras, along with vintage jerseys from the current NHL teams. There is something called “The Skybox” in the game, which is where all your accumulated trophies and winnings are stored. It also has a playable air hockey table in it. BONUS!

The Franchise mode is a lot of fun, and it has most of the essential ingredients like trades, free agents, injuries, etc. Supposedly gamers subscribed to the X-Box Live service will even be able to download roster updates and things like that. Still, I kind of wish there was more of a feel of being involved in a real NHL season though. Stuff like highlights from other games, and more activity from the other CPU controlled teams would have added to the experience a bit. Did I also mention you can create your own players? And get this — you can even specify whether or not every single tooth in their mouth is missing or not. If that doesn’t make a game worth buying then I don’t know what does!

But despite all of the praise I have for this game, I have to admit that it does lack polish in many areas. You can tell that the product was rushed a bit (probably to get it on store shelves before EA’s NHL 2004) and as a result, there are some sloppy bugs and glitches in the game. I had the game freeze on me once while saving data from a season game I had just finished, and that is obviously unacceptable. An example of a more tolerable (though still questionable) bug is when a key player was knocked out of my season line-up for 2 to 4 months when he somehow bumped into a teammate after a stoppage in play. The commentators sometimes continue to comment on plays after a whistle, and frequently they describe plays inaccurately. While it’s nothing too major, an overall feeling of carelessness does seem to prevail after playing the game for a bit.

Although the graphics and animations have been improved from last year’s game, the visuals are still not up to par with EA’s standards. The face models in particular just aren’t nearly as detailed… many players are not distinguishable by their facial features at all. A lot of the new goalie animations are very cool, but the players themselves often look stiff and awkward… most of the time they don’t even appear to be gripping their sticks properly.

The music in the game is annoying (although arguably irrelevant since you can turn it off). With the exception of Queen’s We Will Rock You (the only licensed song occasionally heard in between plays), the soundtrack consists of repetitive instrumental nu-metal tunes written by a band called … . The guitar wanking and bad riffs got on my nerves pretty quickly. I thought that on the X-Box you could use your own music (as many X-Box games allow you to do), however the only option I could find to import a soundtrack was on the Jukebox located within the Skybox area. This was pretty much useless since it only allowed you to listen to music from a menu, not actually during a game.

The other complaint I have is related to some of the difficulty settings. This is a touchy issue and really tough to finetune in a game, but it can quickly lead to frustration. Passes seem to be picked off way too often, especially when coming from goalies. After trying a few passes from your goalie only to have it drop inexplicably into a corner or directly onto an opposing player’s stick, you’ll start to cover up and wait for a whistle instead of giving up a prime scoring chance. This is annoying and it slows the game down a lot. Then there’s the fact that at difficulty settings above Rookie the goalies become nigh inpenetrable. While some of these things can be amended using the various setting sliders, it still doesn’t seem like they play tested the balance of the game very thoroughly here.

I think that the ESPN NHL Hockey’s solid gameplay engine is what really makes me wish the developers had gone the extra mile and fixed some of these nagging issues. It could have been the ultimate hockey game. Still, when it comes to sports games most of the extra frills quickly fall by the wayside if a game isn’t fun to play… but this one is. Very fun. I haven’t played EA’s NHL 2004 enough to make a fair comparison, but I can definitely say that ESPN NHL Hockey is a strong competitor and absolutely worth checking out if you are a hockey fan. Casual gamers may not notice a big difference between the two, while hardcore gamers will probably choose a favourite based on previous biases. I just hope more people give ESPN NHL Hockey a chance because it really deserves the attention. If you’ve become disillusioned with EA’s hockey series, or even just a little bit curious about what else is out there, give it a whirl. You’ll be glad you did. — Sean