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 womans (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