Kill Bill Sword Fight - Are the fights realistic?

The fight scenes and in particular the swordfighting scenes in the two Kill Bill films are considered legendary and full of exciting action. The two films are characterised by the fact that they depict both Japanese and Chinese fighting styles.

These ultimately meet the American way of life, which creates an interesting mix and provides variety. Director and screenwriter Quentin Tarantino has succeeded remarkably well in portraying the different cultures.

As sword fans, we are of course particularly interested in the sword fight scenes from Kill Bill, so we took a closer look at the work of the film choreographers.

Tetsuro Shimaguchi - The Japanese sword fighting master

Tetsuro Shimaguchi is one of a handful of sword-fighting choreographers worldwide and is generally regarded as one of the best. He was responsible for the final fight in Kill Bill Vol. 1. He not only trained Uma Thurman and Lucy Lui in Japanese sword fighting, but also played the role of "Miki" himself after convincing Quentin Tarrantino of his acting skills on set.
According to his own statement, the sword-fighting technique he uses differs from conventional choreography in that he actually touches the opponent with the sword, albeit in a weakened form. This makes his performances appear very realistic.

Since his role in Kill Bill, Shimaguchis has made it his mission to spread samurai culture. For this reason, in 2012 he founded the performance group Sword Master Kamui. With this group, he demonstrates a mixture of classic and modern sword fighting techniques to the audience.

If you want to learn how to fight with the katana like him, you now have the chance to take private lessons from the master swordsman in Tokyo. This video shows how:

Sonny Chiba - Hattori Hanzo and choreographer

Similar to Tetsuro Shimaguchi, Sonny Chiba had two roles in the film Kill Bill Vol. 1. On the one hand, he played the swordsmith Hattori Hanzo. On the other hand, he also worked as a kenjutsu choreographer for the other actors on set.
An interesting piece of background information is that the actor Sonny Chiba also made swords in real life.

Many are bothered by the fact that the real person Hattori Hanzo was actually a samurai and ninja, but not a swordsmith, and the name of the samurai was misused for the film role.
It is not known why this particular name was chosen for the role.

The famous and popular actor Sonny Chiba sadly passed away on 19.08.2021 as a result of Covid-19 disease. RIP

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Yuen Woo-Ping - The Chinese martial arts choreographer

Yuen Woo Ping is probably the best-known and most famous Chinese martial arts film choreographer of all. He became famous for organising the choreography in the blockbuster Matrix with Keanu Reeves, among other things.

In Kill Bill, he was responsible for the Chinese martial arts. In combination with the Japanese techniques of Tetsuro Shimaguchi and Sonny Chiba, this creates unique scenes in the film.

Kill Bill Sword Fight: Our conclusion

The main aim of the fight scenes in the film is of course to entertain the audience, which is why the protagonists don't behave quite like they would in a real fight. However, the scenes were designed by real experts.