Before Kill Bill Vol. 2, the trailer was shown for the new remake of the original "Zatoichi: The Blind Swordsman" movie. I've been gradually collecting all 13 of the original movies that are available on DVD, out of a total of 25 or so. These are really cool, and supposedly one of Tarantino's inspirations. Oddly, I'm pretty sure this remake is already available on DVD as well. Even more oddly, the Netflix info screen for the Zatoichi DVD series says "Shintaro Katsu only made one film in his life...but what a film it is!" It would be a challenge for this to be more wrong.

Vol. 2 was largely fulfilling, but there were one or two spots where I couldn't help but take issue with a lack of realism. Obviously realism is not the point of the movie, but when a storyteller sets up a situation in which the viewer asks, "how can this possibly be resolved?", and then the question is basically answered, "it just is, despite the laws of physics, which also necessitate a B-movie-esque depiction of it that is entirely unconvincing," that is frustrating.

Speaking of the New York Times, or not, I found ironic the recent article that appeared lamenting the death of suspense in entertainment thanks to the inevitable internet leaks of plot twists ahead of time. I can't remember when it started, if recently, but for years now I've avoided reading the Times review of any plot-driven movie I know I'm going to see, because they always reveal so much of the plot. I'm sure they have a policy about it, and the policy is wrong! They don't go so far as to reveal a surprise ending, but sometimes merely saying that there is a surprise ending is enough. In other cases, they simply reveal more of the plot than I want to know, pretty much everything except the ending, sometimes going on for paragraphs that say nothing at all about the quality of the movie. With Kill Bill Vol. 2 (which I read after seeing it), Elvis Mitchell outdid himself.

[I'm going to do some spoiling of my own here, so consider that your warning, although since the movie is weeks old I feel pretty safe. And if you're in some other country that hasn't gotten it yet, do you really count?]

So Elvis revealed not only that the Bride's real name is revealed in the movie, but what exactly it is, and how it was significant in relation to other scenes! Now, sure it doesn't matter whether the name is one name or another, but does spelling it out really belong in a review? In this particular piece it seemed like all the plot details and such were just needed to fill out the extra-long review. But not having enough things to say about a movie like this is hardly justifiable.

To come full circle, my only other complaint about the movie is one that I've had about some others, like the Matrix. A lot of the martial arts action is actually incredibly slow. It's always throw a punch, it's blocked, other person throws a punch, parried, and so on. Pretending fighting is that neat and tidy is one thing, and necessary, but slowing it down is just ridiculous. I once watched a video of two Jeet Kune Do [Bruce Lee's streetfighting martial art] experts sparring, and they moved so fast it was literally a blur of arms. Of course Uma's no expert, but with all the training these actors are supposed to go through, and doing so many takes ... and so on.