Kill Bill: The Whole Bloody Affair (2025) Lionsgate/Action RT: 275 minutes Unrated (strong bloody violence and gore, language) Director: Quentin Tarantino Screenplay: Quentin Tarantino Music: Robert Rodriguez and RZA Cinematography: Robert Richardson Release date: December 5, 2025 (US) Cast: Uma Thurman, Lucy Liu, Vivica A. Fox, Michael Madsen, Daryl Hannah, Julie Dreyfus, Chiaki Kuriyama, Sonny Chiba, Gordon Liu, Michael Parks, Michael Bowen, Jun Kunimura, Kenji Oba, Yuki Kazamatsuri, James Parks, Sakichi Sato, Jonathan Loughran, Tetsuro Shimaguchi, Kazuki Kitamura, Yoji Boba Tanaka, Issei Takahashi, So Yamanaka, Juri Manase, Akaji Maro, Goro Daimon, Shun Sugata, Jin Zhan Zhang, Xiaohui Hu, Ambrosia Kelley, The 5.6.7.8s (Sachiko Fujii, Yoshiko Yamaguchi, Ronnie Yoshiko Fujiyama), Bo Svenson, Jeannie Epper, Stephanie L. Moore, Shana Stein, Caitlin Keats, Chris Nelson, Samuel L. Jackson, Reda Beebe, Sid Haig, Larry Bishop, Laura Cayouette, Clark Middleton, Perla Haney-Jardine.
Rating: *** ½
I can now cross something off my movie bucket list. For two decades, I’ve wanted to see Kill Bill as originally envisioned by writer-director Quentin Tarantino. It was supposed to have been released as one film, but Miramax wasn’t willing to gamble on audiences turning out for a four-hour movie. They gave QT a choice, either cut it down (WAY down!) or split it into two parts. The filmmaker opted for the latter titling them Vol. 1 and Vol. 2. They were released about six months apart, October 2003 and April 2004 respectively, to critical and commercial success. I enjoyed them both, but I hoped to someday see it in its original long form. The movie gods finally granted my wish.
I was elated to hear that Kill Bill: The Whole Bloody Affair would finally be making its way to cinemas. Although it originally premiered at Cannes in 2006, QT wanted to wait until he owned the rights to give it a proper theatrical release. He did, however, screen it in 2011 at his New Beverly Theater in L.A. where it went over well. So how does the whole differ from the two-part version? Structurally, it’s really no different. QT doesn’t rearrange the events of the story in chronological order a la the Godfather Saga. It’s basically Vol. 1 followed by Vol. 2 with an intermission in between. Content is another story.
My biggest gripe about the otherwise perfect Vol. 1 was the switch to black-and-white when The Bride (Thurman, Pulp Fiction) fought the Crazy 88s at the House of the Blue Leaves club. That was a studio decision; they did it to avoid an NC-17 rating. QT restores the insanely bloody sequence to its original blood-red glory. We’re talking copious amounts of spurt and severed limbs. It looks amazing. In addition, the anime sequence depicting the backstory of O-Ren (Liu, Charlie’s Angels) has been expanded to include a fight between the young girl and one of the baddies responsible for her parents’ murders. It too is extremely bloody. Hey, who doesn’t love a good splatter-toon?
There are some who feel that Kill Bill is too self-indulgent on QT’s part. They’re not entirely wrong. He tends to revel in the things he loves. It’s a good thing I like the same things he does. He pays tribute to his favorite genres in Kill Bill: The Whole Bloody Affair, kung fu movies (Vol. 1) and spaghetti westerns (Vol. 2) in particular. He kicks things right off by opening with the classic Shaw Brothers logo (“Shaw Scope”) followed by the iconic “Our Feature Presentation” intro replete with Funky Fanfare music. He proceeds to take us on a four-hour journey through grindhouse/exploitation movie heaven. We get Yakuza bosses and masked assassins, a swordsmith (Sonny Chiba) and kung fu master (Gordon Liu), a seedy strip club, a wedding massacre, a cool anime sequence, split-screen effects, a hit squad whose members are named after deadly snakes and the eponymous leader of said hit squad (“The Deadly Vipers”). There are call-outs to great exploitation classics like Thriller- A Cruel Picture (1973), Lady Snowblood (1973) and Game of Death (1978). It has musical cues from Twisted Nerve (1968), The Grand Duel (1972) and Truck Turner (1974). There are treats aplenty for connoisseurs of exploitation cinema. Same goes for foot fetishists. This is QT we’re talking about.
I’ve learned not to assume everybody is familiar with a movie just because it’s been around for twenty years. I saw Kill Bill: The Whole Bloody Affair with a young friend (hey, Chris!) who never saw the Kill Bill movies. I was only too glad to welcome him to the weird, wonderful universe created by QT. For the benefit of the uninitiated, here is a plot overview. The Bride, an ex-member of the Deadly Vipers, is ambushed on her wedding day by her former boss Bill (Carradine, Kung Fu) and colleagues- Vernita aka Copperhead (Fox, Independence Day), O-Ren aka Cottonmouth (Liu), Budd aka Sidewinder (Madsen, Reservoir Dogs) and Elle Driver aka California Mountain Snake (Hannah, Blade Runner). Bride survives the massacre, but ends up in coma. She wakes up four years later with vengeance on her mind.
I’m not going to get into all the details, but the road to revenge leads to and ends with Bill. They were once lovers and he didn’t take too kindly to her walking away after finding out she was pregnant. I’ll tell you this, there’s a surprise waiting for her at Bill’s home in Mexico.
In my original reviews (long since lost), I awarded four stars to Vol. 1 and three to Vol. 2. Kill Bill: The Whole Bloody Affair gets three and a half stars. It’s great, but not perfect. It has the same problem as all of QT’s films. It’s too dialogue-heavy at times. The man doesn’t know when to end a scene. Some run too long. He loves to hear himself talk. He writes great dialogue, but it tends to slow down the momentum of the movie. Take the end of the second part. Before they finally fight, Bill feels compelled to deliver a long monologue about Superman and dual identities. It’s interesting, but I just wanted him and Bride to get down to it. When they finally do, the fight lasts all of 30 seconds. It’s a minor hiccup in an otherwise great movie.
QT put together an awesome cast for Kill Bill: The Whole Bloody Affair. Uma is magnificently bad ass as The Bride, real name Beatrix Kiddo. Here’s a woman who’s been horrendously wrong by people she once trusted. She’s angry but calculating. She keeps a cool head as she goes about exacting her revenge. Originally, QT wanted Warren Beatty to play Bill, but the actor backed out due to “creative differences”. That’s when the filmmaker turned to Carradine. He adapted the character to fit the Kung Fu star’s style and a great antagonist was born. He’s simply GREAT! Fox, Liu, Madsen and Hannah make a cool foursome. Liu’s character, a Yakuza boss who doesn’t appreciate remarks about her Chinese-Japanese lineage, is especially interesting. Cold and brutal, she’s a perfect match for The Bride.
I love that QT includes kung fu movie legends Sonny Chiba (The Street Fighter) and Gordon Liu (The 36th Chamber of Shaolin). Liu (no relation to Lucy) is especially fun as Pai Mei, the old martial arts teacher who accepts Bride as his student. His scenes are a lot of fun.
Kill Bill: The Whole Bloody Affair is a remarkable achievement. I’d even say it’s epic. Sure, the first half is a bit stronger than the second which tends to drag here and there. Again, this is just a minor glitch. It’s easy to overlook in a film chock full of cinematic goodies. As per usual for QT, the soundtrack is perfectly on point. He opens with Nancy Sinatra’s haunting “Bang Bang” and keeps it going with musical cues from a variety of sources and songs by Santa Esmeralda (“Don’t Let Me Be Misunderstood”), The Human Beinz (“Nobody But Me”), Johnny Cash (“A Satisfied Mind”) and female Tokyo rock band The 5.6.7.8s who also appear in the film (sans footwear, of course).
Let me give it to you in a nutshell. Kill Bill: The Whole Bloody Affair is great! It deserves to be seen on the big screen. Be sure to stick around for the end credits. There’s a bonus animated sequence entitled “The Lost Chapter: Yuki’s Revenge”. It was part of QT’s original screenplay, but he never filmed it due to costs. It’s now connected to the video game Fortnite. Chris had to explain that to me. I had no idea why there was a guy dressed like banana running around.
