Kill Bill 2

Quentin Tarantino’s Kill Bill Volume II uses unique editing techniques to stimulate the viewer both visually and emotionally. Editor Sally Menke uses various aesthetic elements from black and white to reflect the mood, to close-ups matched perfectly with sound to further the opening scene. Thanks to fluid editing, the action and tone hit the audience just hard enough. It is clear that each shot of the scene had the next shot in mind.

The opening scene fades in to a black and white overhead shot of a wedding chapel amidst a vast desert plain. A woman‘s (The Bride) voice overlaps a slow tracking shot of the chapel. The progression of the camera is steady and calm, while the voice-over explains a massacre that occurred within the walls of the little, white chapel. The sequence begins slowly and uses deep space for a reason. By doing this, a startling contrast of the masochistic massacre and the seemingly peaceful ceremony is formed. There are no cuts or abrupt shifts within the establishing shot. Sally Menke purposefully chose not to use cuts because the lack of an edit can be just as effective as using one. The voiceover is in perfect pace with the continuous camera movement. The audience feels as though time is passing through the narration, all through one simple camera movement. The tracking shot begins with the chapel in the right corner of the frame and ends with it being centered. The axis of action guides the audiences eyes to the location where future action will occur. Once the shot is fixed on the immediate outside of the chapel, the viewer notices another contrast. Graphic patterns are present such as dark trees and a white chapel with a deep, black door. This serves as a transition into the next shot.

The next shot puts the viewer inside the chapel, in the point of view of the minister. The rhythmic relationship from the length of the tracking shot to the cuts inside the chapel are extremely different. The movements within the shot remain steadily paced, however cutting is present. In front of the minister sit a bride, a groom, and a few of their friends. The Bride is centered in the middle of the group as well as the frame, in a straight-on medium shot. The graphic relationship between the bride and the frame reflects her significance to the scene. She is the most important part of the composition. The scene continues with a couple cross-cuts alternating views from one side of the action to the other. All the while, the spatial relationship is consistent and able to orient the viewer of the action occurring between the bride, her friends and the minister. The Bride, groom and minister proceed to converse and a cut-away shot turns the viewers attention to a man sitting on a piano smoking a cigarette. The temporal effect this has on the audience is that the cut assumes a passage of time of the conversation. This effect shapes the viewers experience, even though they may not be aware that anything was done at all. The eyes accept the cut and its relationship to the scene as a whole. Menke achieves and maintains a flow from shot to reaction to cut-away without being abrupt or obvious in striking the audience.

Following a reaction shot of the minister, the Bride turns around to face her friends who are sitting behind her. As she turns to the left, the cut moves on the action and the shot is smooth. The cutting and positioning are not in conflict with each other. The shot of the Bride turning matches seamlessly with the side shot of her talking. It feels as though it was one continual movement, when it was actually a cut. The action is not disrupted and the eye perceives it as actual. The Bride leaves her seat and announces that she will be going outside to get some air. The camera cuts to shot of the Bride walking toward the open door. It is a medium shot of her from the front. She continues to walk and the sound of a flute playing enters the scene. Her eyes gravitate to the left, and a cut follows of what she was looking at. These back to back shots re-enforce the continuity rule. The director in which she gazed matched the shot of what was being seen. Next comes a long shot of the door, which is illuminated with light. Darkness surrounds the door, and the shot focuses on the door for an extended period of time. This is significant because Menke chose to hold the shot on the door to illustrate the importance of what lies behind it. The temporal hold on time grabs the audience and allows them to be aware of the situation and the relationship it has to the Bride. It also sets a tone of uncertainty and mystery by using deep space on the long shot. A reaction shot of the Bride is placed after the shot of the door. This manipulates an emotional response to the previous shot. The shots follow each other in an understandable and coherent order.

The Bride walks towards the door and a cut is made to the outside of