Kill Bill Cinematography

Kill Bill is one of my favourite films, partly due to the amazing cinematography and interesting camera work and shorts. Lots of extremes are used to convey the story in an anime style. Part of the film is anime, and it doesn't seem out of place in a film that has taken it's odd angles and poignant subject placement. The most emotional parts of the film are all filmed at least partly from two extreme angles: cinematic birds-eye view with extreme barrel-distortion, and extremely low down at floor level with no effects.

The cinematic birds-eye view with extreme barrel-distortion creates a beautiful image that tells a lot of story very quickly. This top-down scene allows for some interesting placement and easy symbolism, with the bodies looking in mid-movement, their shadows and bloodsplatters like wings. The bride, with her white dress seems especially angelic. It is like the painting of heaven in the ceiling of a church with angels, only instead everyone has been murdered.
The wide-angle lense used adds to this as it gives the scene a dreamlike unreal quality, as does the use of the birds-eye angle as the distortion is not how we see things naturally, and the birds-eye view, when inside is reminiscent of how we see in dreams, and the idea that when we die we float up and look down.
 

This contrasts with the foot-level shots of the scene as the policemen walk around the bodies. While this is also a rare shot to see in a film, it is shot simply and has a quiet realism to it. You can only see a very small amount, it is not gratuitous like the shot about, nor cinematic. It is a frank shot of what these policemen have to see and the crimes that have been done.

When the bride is incapacitated throughout the film this is signified by the use of low shots angled to look up at the characters, as though you are the bride.

However, once the bridge is awake and fighting the camera angles change, she is always at the same level and angle as her peers, never looking up at anyone. There are also wide-angle theatre-like scenes used as the stage for her murdering sprees

The low shots angled to look up at the characters who are stronger than you are reversed as the film goes on, the bride is now looked upon by her victims as she once looked upon them.

The way cinematography is used to tell the story of the Bride in Kill Bill is fantastic, it elevates the film completely. Tarantino is one of my favourite directors because he uses cinematography and interesting unusual shots to tell the story in a dynamic way. Obviously I cannot do anything like what he does in my short films but I would like to try to be as creative and think of different effective ways to tell a story.