Kill Bill: Vol. 1 (2003) on Netflix
A woman rehearses her wedding at a chapel outside El Paso. Bill and his Deadly Vipers shoot everyone there; she wakes from a coma four years later vowing to kill them.
- Netflix3.8/5
- IMDb8.2/101,325,233 votes
- Rotten Tomatoes85%
Trailer
Plot summary
The Bride, once a member of the Deadly Viper assassination squad, rehearses her wedding at a chapel in rural El Paso, Texas. Bill and the other Vipers attack the chapel and shoot the people gathered there. Wounded, she tells Bill he is the father of her unborn child, and he shoots her in the head. She lies in a coma. Four years later she wakes, no longer pregnant, takes a truck and vows to kill Bill and the rest of the squad.
Cast
Did you know?!Facts and trivia about Kill Bill: Vol. 1 (2003)
Can contain spoilers, watch the movie first.
- Thurman was injured in a car crash near the end of filming, while shooting the scene in which the Bride drives to Bill. She had asked for a stunt driver, but Tarantino assured her the car and road were safe; she lost control, hit a tree and suffered a concussion and knee injuries.
- Tarantino originally wrote the role of Bill for Warren Beatty, but rewrote it for David Carradine once the part grew and called for martial arts training. Beatty said he turned it down because he did not want to be away from his family while shooting in China; Bruce Willis was also considered.
- The House of Blue Leaves sequence, in which the Bride battles dozens of yakuza soldiers, took eight weeks to film, six weeks over schedule. The crew avoided computer-generated imagery, using practical effects from 1970s Chinese cinema, including fire extinguishers and condoms, to create spurts and explosions of blood.
- Kill Bill was shot as one film and split in two only after editing began, when Weinstein, known for pressuring filmmakers to shorten their films, suggested the split. That meant Tarantino did not have to cut scenes, such as the anime sequence.
- For the Bride's arrival in Tokyo, the production reused the miniature Yokohama skyline built for Godzilla, Mothra and King Ghidorah: Giant Monsters All-Out Attack (2001), redressing it to double as Tokyo. The homage was arranged by the production coordinator Shinji Higuchi, who worked on both films.
- An early draft included a chapter in which the Bride has a gunfight with Gogo Yubari's vengeful sister Yuki, cut because it would have made the film overlong and added $1 million to the budget. Tarantino later turned it into the short animation The Lost Chapter: Yuki's Revenge, released in 2025.
- When Thurman became pregnant just as shooting was ready to begin, Tarantino delayed production, saying: "If Josef Von Sternberg is getting ready to make Morocco and Marlene Dietrich gets pregnant, he waits for Dietrich!"
- The Pussy Wagon made a cameo in the music video for Lady Gaga and Beyoncé's 2010 song "Telephone" at Tarantino's behest. The 2023 single "Kill Bill" by the American singer-songwriter SZA was inspired by the film.
