Post by slapshot63 on Apr 7, 2007 15:46:59 GMT -5
Grindhouse – A movie that sacrifices the traditional film-making concepts such as good acting, character development, production values, creative directing and an understandable plot outline in favor for sex, gore, nudity, violence and other shocking themes.
No doubt you’ve heard lots of buzz about Robert Rodriquez’s and Quentin Tarantino’s love child, Grindhouse. For those who haven’t heard about it, here’s a little heads up about what it really is. Grindhouse is two full-length feature horror movies written by Quentin Tarantino & Robert Rodriguez put together as a two film feature. Including fake movie trailers, snack adverts and old ratings clips in between both movies. That is basically all you need to know going into this. Well, that and the fact that these two films are chock full of everything politically incorrect. There’s a bevy of blood, guts, language, put downs, racist remarks, more blood, gore, pus, boils, nudity and more things that everyone loves that I can’t remember right now. But yeah, this isn’t a movie for the easily offended. I am not going to go in depth for each movie because it is really best if you go into this not knowing much besides my opinion. Let’s take a look at each individual movie and trailer shall we?
Planet Terror[/u]
First up we have Rodriguez’s entry in this three-hour opus. It’s a zombie movie through and through and the inspirations are quite apparent. There are numerous homages to Romero’s influential zombie flicks as well as some great nods to John Carpenter. But, let’s go at this film one thing at a time. First up is the zombie action. There’s a TON of it on display here and its all great fun. The undead are abundant and look disgusting, as they should. Whenever one of them gets shot a large explosion of blood shoots out. It is over the top and ridiculous but that’s the kind of movie this is.
Everyone in the cast is really great. Michael Biehn is here and is still as awesome as ever. He is hard to recognize, at least I personally thought so. He’s the hard-ass cop who doesn’t take shit from anyone and he played it oh so well. His colleagues are played by Tom Savini who is great here again (when is he not great though) and Carlos Gallardo is the other Deputy who is wholly forgettable. Freddy Rodriguez is our main hero, Wray. He’s a shady character that we find out more about (and incidentally, don’t as I’ll touch on a bit later) but is a complete badass. Freddy plays the part so well and is just awesome to watch on the screen. Rose McGowan is his love interest, Cherry. She is a Go-Go dancer at a club and they meet up again at a local BBQ stop (the best in Texas by the way) and after that is where the shit hits the fan. The rest of the cast fills out nicely and there’s a nice cameo from Bruce Willis in here to boot!
The music is a real highlight in this segment. John Carpenter was originally approached to score Planet Terror but turned it down, so Robert Rodriguez composed the music himself. It wouldn’t have mattered if Carpenter composed it himself or not because Rodriguez’s score sounds just like some of Carpenter’s past films. The iconic sound of Carpenter’s scores resonates throughout this movie like there’s no tomorrow and it makes the movie that much better. The score is just phenomenal overall and the Carpenter sound it has to it gives it that much more of an 80’s feel.
Obviously, we all know this is supposed to be a Grindhouse film, that’s apparent. But, the things that Rodriguez does here to make it feel like a Grindhouse film are really awesome to say the least. The whole film is covered in film scratches, sometimes it feels a little overkill but really isn’t when you know what he’s going for. The whole thing looks like it has had (more than) one too many plays. There’s also a part in the movie where a pivotal scene is occurring and all of a sudden the screen goes blank because there is a “missing reel” and when we finally come back to the movie, all of the major plot points and plot information has already been given! It doesn’t hurt the movie because it was obviously built around the fact that there would be a missing reel so really, anything that is “missing” isn’t important to the plot anyways, it’s just information we’ve been teased with that we would’ve liked to have known. The whole gag is hysterical though. Add to that the whole retro credits sequence and everything else and you’ve got a film that looks like it could’ve jumped right out of the 70’s or 80’s (well, not counting the new technology used in the films such as cell phones).
Overall, Planet Terror is a ridiculously fun and gruesome ride. It’s completely politically incorrect but a fucking blast the whole time. This is not only a great horror/action/thriller flick; it’s also a great zombie flick and a fun time all around. Honestly, Planet Terror is worth the price of admission alone because its just that much fun and is that awesome. But, as we all know, there is another movie included for our pleasure.
Death Proof[/u]
Here is Quentin Tarantino’s half of Grindhouse. Tarantino hasn’t ever disappointed fans before so there were high hopes for his half of the movie, especially because he is a self-proclaimed horror fan and we haven’t seen him do a horror movie before. So, how is the second part of this whole roller coaster of a movie?
Death Proof is an overall thoroughly disappointing mess that definitely stands out as not only Tarantino’s first failure, but also the Achilles' heel that threatens to ruin Grindhouse. You may be wondering how this may be? Well keep on reading Mr. Impatient.
The movie starts with a protracted sequence that sets up a group of nubile babes spewing some of Tarantino's worst dialog, who cross paths with Stuntman Mike at a bar in Texas. The whole thing feels like the set up for the entire movie, but it is really nothing more than an incredibly dragged out introduction that could have been cut down to five minutes or so. The film then jumps ahead an indeterminate amount of time and, in essence, starts all over again as Tarantino introduces a new gaggle of women for us to dabble with. Following his earlier introductory sequence that was just plain bad and boring, Tarantino's second expository build up with his new potential victims eventually degenerates into something that comes dangerously close to excruciating. The dialog reads at best like scraps he discarded from other scripts, and at worst like someone trying to sound like Tarantino. Every other word seems to be “motherfucker” and it gets ridiculous after a while. The women talk about nothing and it just goes on and on and on. The whole movie is essentially a chick flick! I’m sorry but how does a chick flick fit into a Grindhouse feature? It really doesn’t. Things finally seem to turn around when the trio finally runs into Stuntman Mike but the payoff isn’t worth what we had to go through to get there.
The acting is just alright. There’s nobody bad here but nothing that stands out either. There are a couple of people from Planet Terror who return (as different characters, some are the same as well though too) which is neat to see and the new characters also cross paths with a couple of characters from Planet Terror. Other than that, everyone else is forgettable because they’re all essentially the same characters. Oh wait, Kurt Russell is in this! He’s fucking awesome per usual. Stuntman Mike is easily one of his best characters and is just a blast to watch. There’s not much more to say, you just really need to see it for yourself. I didn’t really notice much music to be honest so I’m not going to use this sentence as a whole paragraph. Deal with it.
Tarantino’s film didn’t really have a Grindhouse feel to it. It looked crystal clear which felt really out of place because everything else in the movie had a dirty, aged look to it. Oh sure, the movie had the occasional overflow of grain and scratching here and there but they were so few and far between that is was just a nuisance rather than looking cool like it did in Planet Terror. Even if Tarantino didn’t want as much scratching as Rodriguez used he could have just toned it down again. The missing reel trick is used here again and there are also parts where the film skips which is really funny. The best part though is the fake title. A different title comes up at the title screen and then “Death Proof” is quickly edited in. It’s a small little novelty added to the overall experience of Grindhouse which is, essentially, an experience all its own. But besides the visual effects added to make this feel like a Grindhouse film, everything else felt “meh”. The story was about women so I suppose this is a movie exploiting women. Well, all it did was show the women. There was nothing in bad taste here (well, maybe the one chick using the dreaded “N” word every two lines if you don’t like that sort of thing) like there was in Planet Terror. In the aforementioned movie, there were decapitations aplenty, testicular removal (not shown thank goodness), melting genitals (again, not shown in detail) and other disgustingly funny and enjoyable scenes like that. This is a pretty tame movie and last time I checked, the point of these movies and it being called Grindhouse was to make movies that push the boundaries of good taste and what is acceptable. Rodriguez sure did but Tarantino made a standard, cliché flick that doesn’t try to be different except in its execution (no pun intended).
Don’t get me wrong though, Death Proof is not a terrible film. It just isn’t as good as what we expected and coming off of the high that Planet Terror left us with, it’s jarring to go from that to Death Proof. You expect that since is it coming second, Tarantino will ramp up the exploitation, violence, blood and everything else from Planet Terror (without being redundant or annoying though) but it doesn’t because, as I said, its essentially a chick flick. But, there are enough comedic, thrilling, suspenseful and enjoyable moments that save Death Proof from ruining Grindhouse. Oh and the ending is actually really great. It’s a “What the hell?” ending but so awesome! Don’t let negativity about Death Proof put you off from seeing Grindhouse though, because it doesn’t make it unwatchable. It isn’t a complete abomination and it really isn’t terrible, it just isn’t really good. Then again, I really think I’ll have to view Death Proof again to “get it”. I’ve had a day to digest it and I really think that the negativity to it is because it completely turns the exploitation formula on its head as it trades almost exclusively on character at the expense of a plot. Death Proof is probably the harder and the stranger of the two to get a grip on – an exploitation film done as a character study. Its very good idea, a women's exploitation film that thoroughly celebrates women. Unfortunately, the strength of "Death Proof" is also its weakness, as all the character work slows down the pace a great deal. As interesting as the idea may be, this movie is ultimately not a character study, it's a movie called Death Proof and some tightening could definitely be used here. Even if the movie is underwhelming, Tarantino shows here that he has not lost his flair in directing the actors and making everything look cool.
Fake Trailers[/u]
Machete Directed by Robert rodriguez – This one starts out before Planet Terror and is one of the best trailers in the movie. Danny Trejo is awesome as usual and he is completely perfect for the role here. The whole premise has been done before but what was shown to us was so absurd (Cheech Marin as a gun-toting priest? Brilliant!) and hilarious (and awesome) that you can’t not love this. This is the trailer that they’re actually going to be making into a movie and all I have to say is that I’ll be there opening day to see this bad boy! – 5/5
Werewolf Women of The SS Directed by Rob Zombie – This one is the weakest of the trailers. Word has it that Zombie had over a half hour of footage he wanted to use but the trailer was forced to be hacked to shit so what we got here was less than stellar and not what Zombie had originally wanted. What we do get here is a mediocre trailer that didn’t do much for me. They didn’t capitalize on the Werewolf angle of the trailer and the whole thing felt disjointed. The ending to this trailer is classic though! – 2.5/5
Edgar Wright’s Trailer – I’m not giving the title away to this one because it ruins the whole thing (and here I will formally ask you to not seek out the trailer or the title of it). This one is downright hilarious! You really have to see it but it is really great. – 4.5/5
Thanksgiving Directed by Eli Roth – Now THIS is a great idea. A slasher movie based around Thanksgiving! Brilliant! The trailer is in such bad taste and is so over the top that you can’t help but laugh and want to see a whole movie like this at the same time. You’ve got a decapitation of the guy in the turkey suit at a Thanksgiving parade, a macabre Thanksgiving dinner and even more gore and violence! The announcer’s voice in this one is great as well. Every time he said “Thanksgiving” I busted out laughing. It was a total riot! – 5/5
Grindhouse As A Whole[/u]
I have to admit, I’ve never been to an actual Grindhouse and I’ve really only seen one exploitation film (that I know of anyways) which is Thriller – En Grym Film and I honestly loved that movie. I know, I need to see more but this is just to show you where I’m coming from. I’m not a Grindhouse or exploitation film expert and I haven’t seen any, but Grindhouse, the movie, was a riot. It was one of the most amazing theater experiences of my life. The audience was great and the film was immensely enjoyable. Death Proof was the (much) weaker film but overall, it doesn’t hurt Grindhouse as a whole. The experience was one of a kind and I left the theater knowing that I saw something. The price of admission was warranted 150% and I couldn’t have asked for a better time. The two films were enjoyable in their own respects and the fake trailers shown added a nice touch to the film. The old snack and ratings ads/clips were neat as well. Hopefully Grindhouse will either have a sequel or be made into a franchise with these directors because this was just a sensational experience that nobody should miss.
Planet Terror – 4/5
Death Proof – 2.5/5
Grindhouse – 4.5/5
Links:
IMDB Page
