The Garden

Written and Directed by: Scott Hamilton Kennedy

There existed in downtown Los Angeles a large community farm. The food was simply grown by people for people. It began as an attempt to heal the city after the riots in 1994. For years it it existed peacefully, until one day the owner of the land, who had acquired the property under dubious circumstances, decided to kick everyone off. This documentary tells of the battle to control the farm.

Although I agreed with the sentiment of the film, it must be stated clearly that this documentary is clearly skewed to the side of the farmers. It's not clear how much effort was made to reach out to the other side of the story - and there's a real possibility that a genuine effort was made and declined - but the final product casts one side as the underdogs and the other as the millionaire, politically-connected villain. Not that this excuses the villain's behavior.

Regardless of the "sides" of the story, Kennedy does a great job of showing the personal, legal, and political struggles of the typically disenfranchised group of farmers. Just as they are literally trying to hold on to the land, they also have to work to hold on to hope and to keep their fledgling group together.

The movie definitely has a tear-jerker climax with some devastating imagery. (History spoiler: The farmers lose and the garden gets bulldozed. Seriously.) Even if the outcome is obvious from the start, it's hard not to root for the farmers along the way, which makes the ending even more upsetting.

Masterpiece? This film is not. It does show an allegorical tale of The Haves against The Have Nots and the powerful influence The Haves hold over our world.

I generally recommend this film because of the essence of the story it tells, not because it is a great piece of documentary work.

Kill Bill: The Whole Bloody Affair

A few weeks ago, I was lucky enough (with some help from the Wifey) to get tickets to a special screening of "Kill Bill: The Whole Bloody Affair." The New Beverly Cinema was screening this elusive and long-rumored print which includes both parts of the film unedited, as it was originally shown at the Cannes Film Festival, showing it as "The Fourth Film by Quentin Tarantino" as it was originally advertised. Coming in at just over four hours, this version is how Quentin Tarantino (supposedly) intended it to be seen.

There is no need to get into the bloody details of the plot (pun intended) here. Essentially, a woman survives an attempted assassination and then seeks revenge on the group of people who tried to kill her. There are a few subplots involving the assassins and a couple of battles, all leading to the climactic confrontation with Bill.

A few of the differences between this version of the film and the final version released in the US:

1. The story is treated as one long film, rather than two separate movies. Although it is still divided between "Volume 1" and "Volume 2," they are shown together with only a brief intermission.

2. Since the two parts are shown together, the narrative bridge at the beginning of "Volume 2" - in which The Bride reminds everyone of what happened in "Volume 1" - is completely cut.

3. The Japanese animation sequence showing the back story of O-Ren is slightly more gruesome, including a shot of a human having been gutted.

4. The Bride is shown removing an extra limb from Sophie Fatale, which was only implied in the regular release.

5. The battle in the Japanese dance hall between The Bride and the Crazy 88 gang seems longer and is shown in full color, making it much more graphic. (Apparently, it was edited to black and white to help earn the "R" rating for the final cut.)

From the opening shot of the bloody bride and Bills narration followed by the straight opening credits scored with Nancy Sinatra's haunting "Bang Bang, My Baby Shot Me Down," this film hooks the audience completely into its suspense. Yet the suspense is interesting because it's never a question of if the Bride will get her revenge (especially in "Volume 1" - how else would we get "Volume 2?"), but a question of how. How will all her training pay off? How will all these story lines tie together? How will she overcome the seemingly impervious Bill?

I definitely enjoyed seeing both parts together on the big screen. Although I own both films (and even have the special box that Best Buy gave away when the "Volume 2" DVD was released), I know for a fact that I would never sit down and force myself to watch them back-to-back. Viewing it in this way, though, made it much easier to see the continuity between the two very distinct parts. For example, the importance of the Hanzo sword always seemed out of place in "Volume 2," but made much more sense immediately after "Volume 1."

The New Beverly Cinema also added several trailers to the beginning of the film which were obviously major influences on Tarantino. Although not necessarily affecting the film in any way, it added an interesting perspective to the entire experience of the screening. It also revealed the significance of Gordon Liu and Sonny Chiba's inclusion in the cast, if it was not already understood

Given that Tarantino's films are all so different, it's hard to compare them to each other. And given that his career is still relatively young, it's hard to give this film much perspective. But, ultimately, "Kill Bill" will stand as one of his best, if not, at least, as his most unique.