John Lindal’s Blog

Kill Bill

June 8, 2007 on 10:05 am | In Deep Thoughts, Movies | No Comments

Normally, I blog about a movie soon after I see it, but Kill Bill really wasn’t worth mentioning — until now, when I figured out what was bothering me about it.

All the major characters in the movie, with the exception of the sword maker who had retired, were animals, not people. Sure, they were sentient, but for all the good it did them, they might as well not have been. They were completely governed by their desires and instincts. For example, not once did it occur to the main character that she should forgive Bill and move on — not because he deserved it, of course, but because the alternative, revenge, would ruin the rest of her life.

The characters in the movie were highly skilled, very clever, very smart, and very wily, but all they ever used any of it for was to outwit and kill each other. Lions and hyenas do this, too. The only differences are in technology and tactics.

Animals, as far as we can tell, are governed entirely by instincts and desires, so they cannot choose how to behave. Humans, however, are sentient, which allows us to step back from ourselves, learn the difference between right and wrong, and choose how to behave.

Some people like to claim that the difference between right and wrong is fuzzy or relative or even nonexistent. To me, this is nonsense. Of the Ten Commandments, four through ten (using the Roman Catholic version) should be obvious even to atheists and anarchists, if they stop to think about them. They are all examples of “Do unto others as you would have them do to you,” which is the foundation of a stable society.

Given that there is a clear difference between right and wrong, if one chooses not to learn it, or one does learn it and then chooses to do wrong, then that is Evil. The choice discards what makes the person human and debases him or her to the level of an animal. This is what all the characters in Kill Bill did.