Welcome to the grindhouse! (No spoilers, little bias(?!))

Rating: 8/10 (5 May 2007)

Robert Rodriguez and Quentin Tarantino team up to produce this true-to-form recreation of the classic grindhouse experience. That means unbelievable plots, oodles of violence, and sexxxxx. The film is actually a "double feature", the first movie by Rodriguez and the second by Tarantino. In between are highly entertaining trailers for fictional B movies. The first film, Planet Terror, contains a convoluted plot that ultimately boils down to small town vs. Zombies, starring a very sexy Rose McGowan. Filled with hilariously disgusting moments, purposefully missing what could have been its best scene ("missing" reel), and littered with just plain over the top dialogue, Rodriguez put together a highly entertaining zombie-fest. The film strays a little bit from its grindhouse roots, feeling more parody than true-to-genre, but its great fun. The second film, Death Proof, feels much more grindhouse. The plot builds slowly as we are introduced to a group of three young women, whose pot-smoking and partying are of shockingly sinister interest to one Stuntman Mike (Kurt Russell). Death Proof is not nearly as action packed as the Rodriguez pic, taking a bit too much time to build, but it does feature fun (and long!) car chases and plenty o'tits and attitude. As a whole, Grindhouse is a success: a faithful recreation of the grindhouse experience in the most perverse, entertaining sense. See it in the theatre. ***/4 stars