Culture | Film

Finding inspiration

Helen Nicholson|Staff Reporter
10 April 2012

It’s no secret that Tarantino’s films are hugely influenced by pop samurai movies and spaghetti westerns. He also has a penchant for giving his favourite old-schools stars a new lease of life. We take a look at some of the inspirations for the Kill Bill series...

  • The most strikingly obvious film reference was the yellow tracksuit that Uma Thurman wore in the first Kill Bill — this was the same design as the one worn by Bruce Lee was wearing in Game of Death, which was left unfinished on his death in 1973.
  • Hannie Caulder (Burt Kennedy, 1971) was a typical example of the revenge movies Tarantino so loves. He is said to have the character played by Robert Culp is similar to Sonny Chiba’s role in Kill Bill and Uma’s character can be compared to that of Raquel Welch.
  • Daryl Hannah’s character Elle Driver is based on They Call Her One Eye (AKA Thriller, Bo Arne Vibenius, 1974). Christina Lindberg plays a woman who is forced into prostitution, hooked on to heroin and has her eye poked out when she tries to leave the profession.
  • David Carradine plays the flute in the sequel, which he carved it out of bamboo, and which is inspired by the movie Silent Flute (AKA Circle of Iron, Richard Moore, 1979).
  • The fight in the House of Blue Leaves from the first Kill Bill is based on the film Chinese Boxer (Jimmy Wang Yu, 1969) where Wang Yu fights 100 enemies. He's created an iron fist and wears a surgical mask over his face and was the first full-on open handed contact movie in Hong Kong.
  • Tarantino used to watch the Sonny Chiba TV show Kage no Gundan (Shadow Soldiers) during the eighties. Chiba’s character, Hattori Hanzo, makes an appearance in Kill Bill as the master sword maker.
  • Betrayal, revenge and three-way shoot outs - influences from Sergio Leone’s classic western The Good, the Bad and the Ugly can be seen throughout Tarantino’s film career.

MORE ABOUT

Daryl Hannah
Gangster Films
Quentin Tarantino
Uma Thurman