When Chiaki Kuriyama (Gogo) was shooting the scene where she flings her ball and chain out, she accidentally hit Quentin Tarantino on the head as he stood by the camera.
According to Quentin Tarantino and Uma Thurman in the DVD documentary, the idea for doing "Kill Bill" began during the filming of Pulp Fiction (1994). The two began talking about the kinds of movies that they would like to do, and Quentin said he would like to do a 70's style kung-fu flick. Uma came up with the film's opening shot of her beaten up and wearing a wedding gown.
Quentin Tarantino owns the "Pussy Wagon" and drove as his everyday vehicle to promote the release of Kill Bill: Vol. 2 (2004). He licensed use of it for the Missy Elliott music video, "I'm Really Hot". It also appears in the video for "Telephone" by Lady Gaga and Beyoncé.
The shot where the Bride splits a baseball in two with a samurai sword was done for real on the set. It was done by Zoë Bell, Uma Thurman's stunt double.
Quentin Tarantino originally intended to cast a Japanese actress to play O-Ren Ishii, but before casting began, he saw Lucy Liu's work in Shanghai Noon (2000) and immediately changed O-Ren into a Chinese-Japanese-American so that Liu could play the part.
The black-and-white photography in the Crazy 88 fight scene is known as a homage to '70s and '80s U.S. television airings of kung fu movies. Black and white (as well as black and red) was used to conceal the shedding of blood from television censors. Originally, no black-and-white photographic effects were going to be used (and in the Japanese version, none are), but the MPAA demanded measures be taken to tone the scene down. Tarantino used the old trick for its intended purpose as well as an homage.
Christopher Allen Nelson, who worked on the special effects, revealed in an interview that over 450 gallons of fake blood were used in the two Kill Bill movies.
The island of Okinawa is widely regarded among the Japanese as the single worst place in all of Japan to get decent sushi, so Tarantino's decision to have Hanzo operate a sushi restaurant in Okinawa was an excellent decision, since it permitted Hanzo to leave his former life behind, and not be bothered by those who tried to seek him out, after having taken his blood oath.
As Quentin Tarantino was leaving Japan after initial location scouting and securing the studios, he heard the all girl band "The 5,6,7,8's" playing over the store's speakers. He was so intrigued by the music that he asked a clerk who the band was. When he was told, Tarantino, who didn't have enough time to go to a music shop to get their CD, begged the clerk to sell him their copy. Quentin took the disc home, listened to it, and immediately signed the band to play during the "Showdown at the House of Blue Leaves" segment. All of the band's songs, including the stand-out "Woo Hoo" are covers of early 60's surfer songs.
During filming, actors and actresses often provided a "Hello, Sally!" take. This involves the actor or actress finishing his or her take, turning to face the camera, and yelling "Hello, Sally!". Whether Editor Sally Menke appreciates this, is yet to be reported.
DIRECTOR_TRADEMARK(Quentin Tarantino): [Red Apple cigarettes]: When the Bride arrives at the Tokyo airport, she walks in front of a Red Apple cigarettes advertisement. Red Apple is a "Tarantino brand," one of several fictional products that are often seen in his films. Julie Dreyfus (Sofie Fatale) is the Red Apple model.
The church scene was shot in the Mojave Desert outside of Lancaster, California. Keep an eye out during this scene for cameos by Samuel L. Jackson as the dead organ player and Bo Svenson as the preacher.
The infamous long take scene took six hours to rehearse, and was shot in seventeen takes. After that, Steadicam operator Larry McConkey was rumored to have passed out from exhaustion.
Quentin Tarantino, in his conversation with Indian director Anurag Kashyap, admitted that the celebrated manga animation-action sequence in Kill Bill was inspired from 2001 Hindi-Tamil film, Aalavandhan (2001) starring Kamal Haasan. Tarantino was quoted saying 'Yes, saw this Indian serial-killer film which showed violence as animated'.
The original trailer for this film, although featuring no actual bloodshed, raised the ire of the MPAA with the sight of The Bride's blood-stained clothes. As such it became the first to be subjected to the MPAA's new "no blood" policy for trailers, in which all sight of the bodily fluid must be alternately colored or removed entirely. This is why the trailers for this film (and similarly for every film released in the U.S. thereafter) feature The Bride's clothes covered in blackish-brown stains where the blood would be. Incidentally, the color of dried blood is blackish-brown, which means that the MPAA unknowingly made Tarantino change the color from fresh blood (red) to that of dried blood.
The license plate for Buck's truck is a Texas plate that reads PSY WGN. When the movie is shown on network television, and the name of the truck is edited to "Party Wagon", the license plate remains the same.
In order to achieve the specific look of Chinese "wuxia" (martial arts) film of the 1970s, Quentin Tarantino gave Director of Photography Robert Richardson an extensive list of genre films as a crash course in the visual style they used. The list included films by genre pioneers Cheh Chang and the Shaw Brothers. Tarantino also forbade the use of digital effects and "professional" gags and squibs. As such, he insisted that bloody spurts be done in the fashion made popular by Chang Cheh: Chinese condoms full of fake blood that would splatter on impact.
To entice Robert Richardson to work on the project, Quentin Tarantino had the script sent to his house on Valentine's Day 2002... along with a bouquet of roses.
Elle Driver (Daryl Hannah) whistles the theme from Twisted Nerve (1968) while entering the hospital. The whistling from Bernard Herrmann's composition is isolated until Elle enters a changing room.
The members of the Deadly Viper Assassination Squad are all named after snakes. Bill drives a De Tomaso Mangusta. "Mangusta" is Italian for "Mongoose", which are well-known for their ability to fight and kill venomous snakes, particularly cobras.
The characters streaming down the left side of the screen in the opening scenes are Japanese kanji and hiragana. They read "Hana yome ga kuru, hana yome ga kuru" ("The Bride is coming, the Bride is coming") over and over again.
Quentin Tarantino had intended for three actors of different nationalities to represent their respective countries. Chia-Hui Liu represents China, Shin'ichi Chiba represents Japan, and David Carradine represents the United States. Tarantino said that had Bruce Lee had still been alive, he'd have been asked to appear in Kill Bill as well.
Gogo Yubari is not a real Japanese name. "Gogo" derives from Mach Go Go Go (a.k.a. Speed Racer), a Japanese animé that Quentin Tarantino liked when he was young. Yubari is the name of a small town in Hokkaido, northern Japan, that is famous for melons and film. Tarantino's first visit to Japan, was to showcase Reservoir Dogs (1992) at the Yubari International Fantastic Film Festival.
During the fight scene between Gogo Yubari and the Bride, the sound of bowling pins being knocked over can be heard as Gogo flips over after being hit in the back of the head with a flail.
On the The Making of 'Kill Bill' (2003), Tarantino noted that the split-screen scene, where Elle is about to enter The Bride's room and kill her, was an homage to Brian De Palma.
In Hattori Hanzo's sushi restaurant, there is a four-character Chinese saying hanging above the bar. It says "zui sheng meng si," literally "drunk birth, dream death." A rough meaningful translation is "To lead an unimportant and often dissipated life."
Tarantino said the Grindhouse films were also an influence on Kill Bill: Vol. 1 (2003). He later got to make a Grindhouse film with Death Proof (2007).
When Tarantino planned to cast Gogo and Yuki Yubari, his first choices were Chiaki Kuriyama and Ko Shibasaki. Both had roles in the hit movie, Battle Royale (2000).
Sofie Fatale's cell phone ring is "Auld Lang Syne", specifically the tune for the line, "Should auld acquaintance be forgot". However, the tune is also a popular tradition in Japan, where it is known as "Hotaru no Hikari". This version contains completely different lyrics, and is commonly associated with graduation ceremonies.
The name Hattori Hanzo was borne by four ninjas in feudal Japan but the most famous was born in the mid-sixteenth century. As well as being an excellent strategist and a master of the spear, he and his ninja were instrumental in ushering in the Tokugawa Period of Japanese history (1603-1868).
On the wall of the House of Blue Leaves are the letters Q and U. These refer to the first names of Quentin Tarantino and Uma Thurman, as the creators of The Bride.
DIRECTOR TRADEMARK (Quentin Tarantino): (bare feet): Lucy Liu is barefoot as she runs to kill Boss Tanaka. The band at the House of Blue Leaves is barefoot. The Bride is barefoot as she escapes from the hospital, and tries to regain control of her legs. Uma Thurman's bare feet were introduced in Pulp Fiction (1994) before her face is shown.
"The Bells" sign seen on the letterbox at the beginning of Chapter One was given to Uma Thurman's stunt double Zoë Bell by Quentin Tarantino. Bell presented it to her parents, The Bells.
The Bride refers to Bill's assassins as the vipers. Their formal title is "The Deadly International Viper Assassination Squad". Or, for short THE DIVAS.
Although the "Old Klingon proverb": "Revenge is a dish best served cold" is from Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan (1982), the quote is a paraphrase of a line from the book "Les Liaisons Dangereuses" (1782) by Choderlos de Laclos. Khan is a genetically enhanced human.
The entrance to the traffic tunnel in Tokyo is in fact the entrance to the second street tunnel in Los Angeles (Blade Runner (1982)) with Japanese traffic signs added.
In the original script, Johnny Mo was called Mr. Barrel. He had a Kato mask on a stick, like someone from a seventeenth century costume ball. Mr. Barrel didn't like the rubber bands on the typical Kato masks because they 'fucked up his hair'. The Bride convinces him not to fight her, and he walks away, leaving O-Ren with no bodyguards.
The conversation between Hanzo and the assistant, where the assistant says "If this were the military, I'd be General by now!", is taken almost verbatim from Fighting Back (1948).
Daryl Hannah's character is called "Elle Driver." The production team for the documentary Full Tilt Boogie (1997), a documentary about the production of From Dusk Till Dawn (1996) (which starred Quentin Tarantino), is called " L. Driver Productions".
Part of the movie was shot at the legendary The Shaw Brothers Creative Group studio in Hong Kong. Quentin Tarantino has seen so many movies made at the studio, he felt it was important for him to work there.
During the scene when O-Ren Ishii celebrates her ascension to the head of the Tokyo Yakuza, she is wearing a black kimono. It is a kurotomesode with long sleeves (dangling near the floor). The kurotomesode is the most formal kimono, is for married women only, and would only be made with short sleeves.
Michael Bowen (Buck) and David Carradine (Bill) share three siblings, but are themselves not related. Carradine is the son of John Carradine and Ardanelle McCool, while Bowen is the son of Sonia Sorel and Michael Bowen, Sr. However, Sorel and John Carradine had three children together, including Keith and Robert Carradine.
Quentin Tarantino has said in interviews that had Warren Beatty taken the part of Bill, the character would have been more of a suave, James Bond-type.
The music sampled for "Ode to O-Ren Ishii" is the title track from the film The Psychic (1977). Since an instrumental version is not included on the soundtrack, it has become an increasingly popular download.
The paintings on the walls of Vernita's (Vivica A. Fox's) house, in the opening scenes, were provided by visual artist Rodney Grier, brother of Pam Grier, the star of Tarantino's earlier film Jackie Brown (1997).
"Hattori" means "weapon", in a feminine context, in Hindi, the modern form of Sanskrit, the ancient language for Hinduism and Buddhism. Hattori means hammer in Hindi
In an interview, Quentin Tarantino stated that the Raquel Welch western Hannie Caulder (1971) is one of his influences behind the film. In that film, Hannie Caulder becomes a vengeful gunwoman after her husband is murdered, and when she is raped by the three outlaws responsible. In this film, The Bride (Thurman) seeks vengeance upon Bill, and the Deadly Viper Assassination Squad, after they wrong her at her wedding, in which her husband-to-be, and the wedding guests, are slain and The Bride is raped by Buck, while in her coma.
The members of the Deadly Viper Assassination Squad are all named for snakes: Sidewinder, Black Mamba, Cottonmouth, Copperhead, and California Mountain (King) snake.
When Uma Thurman is approaching 'The Bells' house, "Music Box Dancer" is playing in the background. Frank Mills composed this song after several years of performing in a band called 'The Bells'.
Although the siren sound heard before The Bride goes on a rampage is credited to Quincy Jones's theme from the television show Ironside (1967), it is more of an homage to the Shaw Brothers' 1972 kung-fu classic Five Fingers of Death (a.k.a. King Boxer). The U.S. release of Five Fingers of Death used the siren from the Ironside (1967) theme whenever its protagonist went on a vengeful rampage.
Odd Future sampled O-Ren Ishii saying, "Now, if any of you sons of bitches got anything else to say, now's the fucking time!" for their 2010 song "Alright."
Sonny Chiba, who plays the sword maker Hattori Hanzo, had played a character by the same name in the 1980's hit Japanese television show "Kage No Gundan". It translates to "Shadow Warriors", and depicted ninjas of feudal Japan.
As Earl McGraw (Michael Parks) arrives at the Two Pines crime scene, there are several shades of sunglasses side-by-side on the dashboard of his car. Tarantino is paying homage to the H.B. Halicki car chase classics Gone in 60 Seconds (1974) and The Junkman (1982) where star/director Halicki also placed sunglasses next to each other on the dashboard of cars he drove.
The line "My name's Buck, and I'm here to fuck." was taken from the opening line in Tobe Hooper's horror/exploitation film Eaten Alive (1976). Robert Englund's character says "The name's Buck, and I'm rarin' to fuck."
The Bride draws the figure of a square in the air using her finger. In Pulp Fiction (1994), Mia Wallace (Uma Thurman) makes a similar gesture while talking to Vincent (John Travolta).
The television series Xena: Warrior Princess (1995) has been speculated as one of Quentin Tarantino's inspirations behind the film. Quentin Tarantino admitted in an interview that he is a Xena fan. He praised the show for its action, storytelling, and the magnificence of Xena's backstory.
While O-Ren Ishii's age is never mentioned, we can gather that she is either 29 or 30, since The Bride states that she was 25 when she took her part in trying to kill her, and it is four years later.
Originally the whole scene where the Bride takes on the Crazy 88 was in full color. However, the violence in this scene got the movie an NC-17 rating. In order to keep the movie's R rating, the really gory content in the scene was edited into black and white, which somehow decreases the amount of gore in a film.
The Bride's killing one of the Crazy 88 with a hatchet is a possible nod to Mannaja (1977), in which the main protagonist Blade (Maurizio Merli), a bounty hunter whose weapon of choice is a hatchet, seeks revenge upon McGowan for the death of his father.
Quentin Tarantino: [long take] After the Bride leaves O-Ren's door at the House of Blue Leaves (when Go-Go returns inside) the camera follows her down the stairs through the bar, past the kitchen, into the ladies room; we then go out of the ladies' room, back to the stairs and follow Sofie Fatale along the exact same path to the ladies' room, ending with the ring of her cellphone. The shot is done in a single, unedited take.
Quentin Tarantino: [Trunk Shot] While The Bride is interrogating Sofie Fatale, we see from Sofie's point of view inside the trunk of her own car looking up at the masked Bride.
The trivia items below may give away important plot points.
At the beginning of the fight scene between O-Ren and The Bride, after O-Ren says, in Japanese, "I hope you saved your energy. If you haven't you may not last five minutes.", it is exactly 4 minutes and 59 seconds from the time she steps forward, and the music cues, until the fatal blow of the duel. From the time she says "five minutes" until the fatal blow it is precisely five minutes and thirty seconds.
In the early stages of filming, O-Ren was supposed to be decapitated at the end of her battle with the Bride, but it was changed, because she would have never known that the Bride's sword was truly a Hanzo sword had she been beheaded.
When The Bride is walking towards the stairs, in the House of Blue Leaves, to fight the first round of bodyguards, you see a shot taken from underneath through the glass floor. The soles of her shoes read "Fuck U".
The character Gogo was originally written as two characters: the twin Yubari sisters, Gogo and Yuki. Gogo had almost no lines, and after her death at the hands of The Bride, Yuki would seek her out, only to be killed as well, in the "lost" chapter "Yuki's Revenge". All of Gogo's dialogue in the final film would have been spoken by Yuki.
Bill calls The Bride by her last name, Kiddo, in the film's opening scene. The audience, not knowing her last name, is meant to assume it is simply a term of endearment.
Julie Dreyfus speaks three different languages in the movie. She speaks fluent Japanese until the end, where she speaks in her native French to insult The Bride, and then in clear English when she talks to Bill. In real-life, Julie Dreyfus is trilingual.
The line that O-Ren and The Bride speak together in the House of Blue Leaves - "Silly rabbit, Trix are for kids" - refers to an advertising slogan for Trix breakfast cereal. It is also a cryptic reference to The Bride's name, which in Kill Bill: Vol. 2 (2004) is revealed to be Beatrix Kiddo.
Quentin Tarantino and producer Harvey Weinstein have been quoted as saying that Kill Bill was separated into two parts well into production. By splitting the movie into two parts, the film's advertising tagline, "In 2003, Uma Thurman Will Kill Bill!" was made false.
The original script featured Bill to be a master chemist. The liquid in the syringe was pointed out to be a concoction created by Bill, dubbed "Goodbye Forever". These potions and elixirs were to be detailed by on-screen subtitles. The Bride would also use a mix called "The Undisputed Truth" to get information from Sofie Fatale. In Kill Bill: Vol. 2 (2004), Bill would use "The Undisputed Truth" on the Bride.
Originally, Quentin Tarantino wanted Michael Madsen to play Johnny Mo. However, he decided that Madsen would be better as Bill's brother, so he had him play Budd instead.
The final fight scene in Django Unchained (2012) in which Django (Jaime Foxx) tells Steven (Samuel L. Jackson) to stay right where he is mirrors the scene in which The Bride tells Sophie Fatale to stay right where she is in the aftermath of the sword battle with the Crazy 88.
When The Bride is standing outside Vernita Green's house, an ice cream truck jingle is played. It's "Music Box Dancer" by the Canadian pianist Frank Mills, a 1978 hit single, also used in the Nickelodeon television series Pinwheel (1977). In the original script, Yuki Yubari (attempting to avenge the death of her sister, Gogo) stalked The Bride in an ice cream truck.
The character of Pai Mei is first seen in Chia-Hui Liu's second film Shaolin Martial Arts (1974). He later appears, if not necessarily using the same name, in several other Shaolin-related Gordon Liu films directed by Chia-Liang Liu, his adopted brother, and director of many of his early films, as well as many other acclaimed Martial Arts films. Numerous Martial Arts techniques in this film, were first seen on-screen in the same film, such as the "hand span punch", and the strike used in Vol. 2, to pluck out an eye.
The scene in which The Bride kills Vernita Green, and the "I'll be waiting" speech she makes to Nikki, mirrors a similar scene from another revenge film - The Punisher (1989). In a similar scene from that film, Frank Castle (Dolph Lundgren) says to Tommy Franco, "Because if you don't... I'll be waiting", when he kills his father Gianni (Jeroen Krabbe).
Tarantino is known to be one of the most notable admirers of Jackie Chan, having presented Chan with the lifetime achievement award at the 1995 MTV Movie Awards). Tarantino had often paid unannounced but intentional homage to the Hong Kong martial artist. For instance, the Bride's face-off with Gogo Yubari (Chiaki Kuriyama) was influenced by the climatic scene from Chan's relatively mild romp Shanghai Noon. While, at least three notable references originate from Chan's 1976 film, Shaolin Wooden Men (1976): Pai Mai's introduction scene references the stairway and water training scene; Pai Mai himself though in white in Kill Bill is the blind orange master monk (who in Kill Bill blinds Elle); and, finally, the five point finger exploding hand technique comes from the end battle scene of Shaolin Wooden Men where the villain uses a special punch technique on the protagonists but is only able to deliver 4 of the 5 blows (with the protagonist holding his heart, as Bill does, right before dying).
There are possibly a couple of references to late martial arts actor, Bruce Lee. The Bride's yellow jumpsuit resembles that of the one Lee wore in his final film. Also, when The Bride is rolling on the ground, chopping the feet off of her enemies could also be a reference to the first dojo brawl where Bruce Lee is attacking the feet of his enemies with nunchucks in "Fist of Fury."
Tarantino had written the film with Warren Beatty in mind. Beatty left the film over creative differences. Beatty felt Bill should not appear until the bride shows up to kill him at his hideout.