You are 15 years old in Japan of the near future. Economic meltdown causes the government to devise a punitive scheme whereby a random class of school-kids must battle to the death. This is the twisted world of the movie Battle Royale – and, in it Japanese teen idol Chiaki Kuriyama seems to flourish. Indeed, it was her stirring performance in Kinji Fukasaku’s film that first brought her to the attention of Tarantino.
Kuriyama does have a fairly extensive acting CV in her homeland, where she’s revered, but QT’s casting of her as the deadly schoolgirl Gogo Yubari in Kill Bill Vol. 1 – a maniacal mistress of all weapons who can kill you a dozen different ways – has won her plaudits and a jailbait rep (with all the men’s mag drooling that entails) in the West. And that, of course, would largely be down to the school uniform – a nod to the Japanese water sector’s (their polite euphemism for the sex industry) favourite form of attire – as evidenced by countless pulpy movies and the prolific amounts of Tokyo-originated comic-book porn featuring girls in knee-socks.
Still, Gogo’s not to be trifled with. She’s way cooler than either Daryl Hannah’s ruthless Elle, or Vivica Fox’s so-called markswoman (who managed to miss The Bride from five-feet away in her kitchen). She’s handy with a ball-and-chain, and is easily the craziest of the Crazy 88 with whom the Bride must do battle in the House of Blue Leaves.
Go-go more than proves her worth as a dragon-girl when she asks that poor chap if he wants to fuck her, and then sadistically stabs him for saying ‘yes’. Perhaps she just wasn’t ready to commit to a relationship.