"Revenge is never a straight line. It's a forest, And like a forest it's easy to lose your way... To get lost... To forget where you came in." -Hatori Hanzo
Reservoir Dogs
When a movie is so violent, gripping and powerful that it bludgeons senses, it normally wouldn't be considered a source of moral value. However, like the disconnected, non-linear plots of his films, Quentin Tarantino expects the audience to assemble the thematic frameworks themselves. Unlike the usual artistic representations of culture, Tarantino delivers his themes open-endedly. In a 1993 interview with Graham Fuller, Tarantino says:
Another concept that permeates his films is Karma. Simply put, in gardening terms, Karma is "reaping what is sown." According to the book "Quentin Tarantino and Philosophy: How to Philosophize with a Pair of Pliers and a Blowtorch," philosophers Luke Cuddy and Michael Bruce write: “Karma does not deal with any notion of justice. It deals with what is, and what causes what. Simply stated, all the actions a person takes have consequences.” The reason that Tarantino piques my interest in this topic is that I too understood the full extent of Karma the hard way -- as I was being choked!
Pulp Fiction is the story of a hit man Jules Winnfield (Samuel L. Jackson) who enters a 'transitional period' of his life from gunslinger to that of a 'shepherd.' His partner, Vincent Vega (John Travolta) does not join him on this path of righteousness, and is killed as a result at the hands of Prizefighter Butch (Bruce Willis), whose only concern is protecting his father's watch from the World War II given to him as a kid by Christopher Walken. When Butch saves the life of mob boss Marsellus Wallace (Ving Rhames), he remains one of the few survivors in the film. Tarantino's most recent film Inglourious Basterds can be considered a history-rewriting satire designed to give the Nazis a dose of their own medicine - namely cold-blooded violence. Because the audience knows that it's a fictional film, the movie gets its appeal from the overdue poetic justice delivered in the form of Aldo Raine (Brad Pitt) and his crew of dirty Basterds. However, for a film filled with examples of characters interlocked in a cause-effect environment, we turn to the two-volume series Kill Bill.
At face value Kill Bill is a story of revenge. After losing her child as a result, a woman whose name isn't revealed until Volume 2, Beatrix Kiddo (Uma Thurman), suffers greatly as a result of the massacre of her wedding by her groom-to-be Bill. Standing between Beatrix and her revenge is Bill's assassination squad and the crime syndicate the Crazy-88's. Like previous Tarantino films, Kill Bill is out of order, but every sub-plot has an impact upon the other scenes, in an extremely interconnected causal-reaction web. Cuddy and Bruce write: “In the interconnected world, causes and results are linked and are therefore interdependent. Think of an ecosystem. Every part of the ecosystem plays a specific and interdependent role. If there is a change in one aspect of the system, then every other facet changes in causal response. The river is the home of the fish, crawdads, water spiders, and beavers. The river is cut into the bank of the surface of the earth. Plants and shrubs grow in the top soil and their roots grow down to drink from the river and water below. Deer and other animals consume the vegetation, fruit, and river water, and there is a whole life-dependent cycle of predator and prey which seeks a balance of sustainability. In other words, an ecosystem is a collection of interdependent causes and results, existing in an interconnected world.”
Of course, total understanding of cause-and-effect would make for a pretty uneventful action flick, and so the characters each have different limitations. Bruce and Cuddy continue: “Beatrix lives in the interconnected, interdependent world of Kill Bill where the law of causation (Karma) is in full effect. On one level she understands her interconnectedness with the world and her place in it. Unfortunately, she doesn't see the extent of the interconnectedness. Her understanding is limited. She sees Bill and the assassination squad as the course of her suffering, so she kills Bill and the assassination squad. What she doesn't see is that this is a band-aid and that more suffering will occur.”
Bill's assassination squad: Elle Driver, Vertnita Green, Budd, O-Ren Ishii
As an actual depiction of 'Reaping what is sown,' Cuddy and Bruce write: “To illustrate, imagine your mind is a plot of land or a garden which has been planted with positive or negative seeds. It is up to you to water the right seeds in order to convert anger, fear, and jealousy into compassion and right actions. When your roommate yells at you for eating the last microwave burrito, you know she is acting that way because she is suffering. You can relate to her suffering, and instantly, you are closer and have compassion for that person. If Beatrix adopted this empathetic perspective, then she would water those positive seeds and not seek revenge. ...To truly end suffering, Beatrix has to look inside and begin to eliminate that internal static. Her lack of a true understanding of interdependence does not allow her compassion to grow.”
The first Volume of Kill Bill is much like a Samurai epic, while the second Volume is similar to a Sergei Leone Western. In the first Kill Bill, Beatrix Kiddo slays Vernita Green in her kitchen, only to notice that Vernita's daughter Nikki was witness to the whole event. Beatrix acknowledges that while she is punishing others responsible for her misery, her actions will also be punished. She says to Nikki: "It was not my intention to do this in front of you. For that I'm sorry. But you can take my word for it, your mother had it comin'. When you grow up, if you still feel raw about it, I'll be waiting." She expects the retaliation of her anger to return in the form of an older, revenge-driven Nikki. Because Beatrix chooses violence to solve her problems with, her suffering will continue through the cycle of vengeance.
In the second Volume of Kill Bill, Budd is speaking to Bill outside of his trailer about the bloodbath of Beatrix's revenge. Budd says: "That woman deserves her revenge and we deserve to die." Then, pointing out the newest branch of cause-and-effect generated by violence, he curiously says: "Then again... so does she." In other words, one cannot cause suffering to another without there being suffering delivered in return in some way, shape or form. Understanding this single principle will deplete the urge to vindicate, avenge or punish others, while being compassionate will cycle a new, positive momentum.
Recognizing that we live in a changing world, that nothing remains the same, and that anyone has the potential to become a 'shepherd' is a monumental step for a divided society, and that feelings of envy, anger, revenge are unnecessary because personal actions carry with them personal consequences. When re-watching any movie, take a moment to decide if the decisions each character takes is in accordance with Karma. As a result, do the characters break free, or continue to suffer? The goal is to spread self-generating compassion to everyone until positivity returns full-circle. Like Jules Winnfield, all it takes is one mind-blowing experience to discover the potential to change paths and find the one that resonates most with who you are. In the words of Don Juan: "For me there is only the traveling on paths that have heart, on any path that may have heart. There I travel, and the only worthwhile challenge is to traverse its full length. And there I travel looking, looking, breathlessly."
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