On Film: Grindhouse

It's funny how some things are considered to be bad until the right person says they aren't.  These seedy grindhouse films of the 60's and 70's have long been misunderstood as just simply B films.  Yes they are that, but they are a lot more fun than most critics gave them credit for back when they were being released.  Now many critics praise those films for their edgy expressionism and their inherent political commentary.  I grew up loving these films.  I never had the experience of seeing to many of them (I did get to see one or two) on the big screen but I saw tons of them on VHS when I was growing up.  Now companies like Blue Underground, Synapse, and Elite Entertainment are giving these films fantastic restorations and releasing them to DVD with bonus features.  Many of the films I saw edited on VHS when I was young I'm experiencing all over again in their newly released uncut versions.  From what I'm hearing I'm in for a similar experience with Grindhouse as a good amount of the film had to be cut in order to get an R rating.



Robert Rodriguez made my favorite of the two films that make up Grindhouse with Planet Terror.  In the film a group of marines that have returned from Afghanistan are negotiating to buy toxic gas from a criminal/scientist.  The deal goes awry and the scientist blows the tanks and sends the gas out into the air.  Immediately people begin, well, melting and turning into maniacs, not really zombies because they aren't dead, not yet anyway.  They do have a penchant for human blood though.

The story eventually brings a rag tag group of survivors together to fight off the hordes of infected and escape, to put the ocean at their back and defend themselves against any infected that try to attack them.  For some reason though, the members of this group aren't infected even after having been exposed to the gas.  They are the cure, and the marines want them now that they can't buy the gas.  The two leaders of the group are Cherry (McGawon) an ex stripper who wants to become a stand up comic and Ray, her on again off again boyfriend.  In an attack Cherry lost her leg and was given a wooden stick to replace it.  Ray is mysterious, the local Sheriff won't let Ray touch a gun until it becomes absolutely necessary and that's when we discover he is actually El Ray.  From context we learn that "El Ray" is some bad ass with weapons but that's all we ever get.  El Ray eventually build's Cherry a new leg, made of a gun with a grenade launcher attached!

This film features nearly everything that those old classic grindhouse films had, the good and the bad.  There's gore galore, over the top action, and scene chewing dialogue that's hilarious.  There's also clumsy dialogue and incomplete plot lines such as that of "El Ray".  I think these mistakes are purposeful.  They are Rodriguez's attempt to do a true grindhouse film.  The bits that were common to the films of the era, the nudity, is joked about in Planet Terror when just as some extreme nudity was about to happen a "missing reel" error would appear on screen.

Planet Terror is a fairly tight film that stays true to its vision and it's consistent all the way to the end.  It's just pure fun.  Oh, and did Rose McGowan really need any more cool factor than she already had?  She's carried the Goth hot chick moniker for years and now with this film she just got even cooler, and hotter!



Quentin Tarantino's film Death Proof goes for a different place from the 60's and 70's.  Tarantino's approach was more in line with a film like Vanishing Point, which is referenced many many times in Death Proof.  I also felt his film had a bit to much padding and it wasn't as consistent in tone.  It almost felt like he wanted to make two different films.

In his film a group of women are just hanging out at a local bar chatting with some guys they met there.  Nothing important is really said, Tarantino just flexes his encyclopedic movie and music knowledge.  Sitting at the bar is Stuntman Mike (Russell) a local who used to be a stunt driver for the likes of Hawaii Five-O and others.  The sequences in the bar seem to go on for quite a long time until another girl at the Pam (McGowan) asks Mike for a ride.  He agrees and a while later they leave.  With some of Tarantino's patented snappy dialogue Mike reveals himself to Pam and kills her, with his car.  Later he kills the other group of girls and beats himself up in the process.  This seems like the end of the film, but no, there's more.

Mike stalks another group of girls two of which are gear heads.  When he decides to go after them the tables get turned with Russell giving a hilarious performance.  The problem is that we are given another half hour or more of padding before finally getting into the last chase.  The padding isn't very interesting at all really and in fact it doesn't do a great job of investing us in all of these new characters.  We do connect with the main two though.

Death Proof does offer some great thrills and chills don't get me wrong, it just seems longer than it should be.  The bits of the film that are some classic Tarantino are also very much worthwhile.  Along with what you'd expect from Tarantino there are some hilarious moments of exploitation to add to the thrills of the two main car chases.  Also, Tarantino seems to be a bit too in love with his image to apply as much of the same print damage effects to his film as Rodriguez does to Planet Terror.  My only thought is that Planet Terror was meant to be the film that ran forever while Death Proof was the brand new feature just added to the Grindhouse.

The trailers that ran before and in between the two films were a blast, and some of them I'd actually like to see as real films.  Standouts were Machete, Rob Zombie's tribute to Ilsa Shewolf of the SS and Eli Roth's Thanksgiving.  Grindhouse is a fantastic experiment and sure to be one of the most unique film going experiences of the year.  I've heard Tarantino comment that he'd like to do more Grindhouse films and I hope in such a big way that he and Rodriguez make Grindhouse a franchise and we see tributes to Caged Heat, any Russ Myer films, the Ilsa films and other "classic" films from the grindhouse era.