Went to see 'Grindhouse' today.
Grindhouse is two movies back to back, Robert Rodriguez's 'Planet Terror', and Quentin Tarantino's 'Death Proof'. I feel I should review them one by one here.
The first one, 'Planet Terror', comes off as a tribute to the classic zombie movie. Its bloody, its comically disgusting, its, everything it looks like it is from its trailer. Sadly tho, it was actually kind of stupid. I get it, classic zombie movie, but its not like the genre has died, we still get zombie movies all the time and they all follow pretty much the same classic formula for a zombie movie. So it really just felt like yet another zombie movie, wasn't all that special, wasn't all that great, and, thats about all I have to say about it really. It was ok, but it was kind of stupid.
The second film, 'Death Proof', on the other hand, is a masterpiece. This one comes off as a tribute to the classic car movie, such as 'Dual', 'The Hitchhiker' (the original that is), and of course 'Vanishing Point'. Kurt Russell is a stuntman serial killer, who kills his victims by using his car as a weapon. This is a real tribute to the classic movies of its type. And its also classic Tarantino style, meaning long dialog scenes, where the characters just talk to each other, and talk, and talk, but the dialog is just so well written that you could just listen to them talk for an hour. This is classic Tarantino, he writes incredible character dialog. Won't say too much about it and give anything away, but 'Death Proof' also has what has got to be one the best car chase scenes in movie history, and one of the most satisfying endings. The entire audience, and me as well, just applauded at the end of 'Death Proof'. It was awesome ! I'd actually really like to see 'Death Proof' again, but wouldn't want to have to sit through the first film again to get to it.
For the movie as a whole, it being a double feature named Grindhouse, it came off very well as what it is supposed to be. A real tribute to the classic film style of grindhouse cinema. It has cheesy 1970's looking 'feature presentation' screens, a couple of fake movie trailers before it and between the films, and a very grainy, scratched film, look throughout, this done purposely. There was also a few 'missing reel' scenes, where it would seem the film has broken, or been cheaply horribly edited, and the word 'missing reel' just appears on screen for a few seconds. Interestingly, the only scenes that were missing reels were obvious sex or excessive nude scenes, and I have to wonder if they will be included at some point on a special edition DVD.
Overall, its an experience. If you just sit back and let yourself enjoy it, it does feel like you're watching a classic double feature from the days of old. As I said the first film was stupid, and the second a masterpiece, but overall as the entire package that 'Grindhouse' is, its the most fun I've had in a movie theater in years.
One final afterthought as well, Tracie Thoms, who people might remember from 'Rent', who is one of the main characters of 'Death Proof', was FANTASTIC here. I can't wait to see 'Death Proof' again just to see her incredible performance again.
