Hands Down the Most Original and Innovative Motion Picture of the Year!

Rating: 9/10 (20 November 2007)

Let's start this review off with a brief lesson in film history. Grindhouse movies were low-budget horror/exploitation films made during the 60s, 70s and 80s featuring extremely graphic violence and/or explicit sex. They were generally shown two at a time as double features in rundown, sleazy movie theaters. They were always shot on grainy crappy film that were poorly spliced together, and some of the time the movies were missing whole reels of film. You must remember, this was a time when movies weren't what they are today. Examples of "grindhouse cinema" would be 'Blacula', 'Cannibal Holocaust' and 'Faster, Pussycat! Kill! Kill! Kill!'. Tarantino and Rodriguez, who obviously grew up watching these films, decided to make this double feature titled 'Grindhouse' to mimic and pay homage or tribute if you will, to the old little campy exploitation flicks that embodied their childhood and influenced them as filmmakers.
The impressively long 192 minute runtime is structured in a bit of an odd way. First we have a fake cheesy movie trailer directed by Robert Rodriguez. It's called 'Machete', and it's my favorite of the trailers. It stars Danny Trejo (From Dusk till Dawn, Desperado) as a bad-ass illegal immigrant commissioned by the government to kill a crooked Mexican councilman. When Trejo tries to kill the councilman, he is ambushed by the people who hired him. Then it's REVENGE TIME. He goes on a kill crazy rampage with machetes and guns to get the motherf__kers responsible. HILARIOUS!
After the four minute preview, the first feature begins -- Robert Rodriguez's 'Planet Terror'. This was my favorite of the two feature length films. It takes place in Austin, Texas where a nuclear chemical deal between a deranged scientist hell-bent on castrating people and collecting their genitals (Naveen Andrews from 'Lost') and a BAMF Marine guy (Bruce Willis) goes terribly wrong. The chemical, which turns people into flesh eating contagious zombies, gets let out in the air. This story surrounds a bunch of misfits fending off zombies, including a one-legged stripper with a dark comic wit (Rose McGowan), a bad-ass knock-around criminal named El Wray (Freddy Rodriguez), a masochistic doctor (Josh Brolin) and his cheating wife (Marley Shelton). 'Planet Terror' is filled to the brim with extremely graphic but totally unrealistic and cheesy violence/gore. It also features much more humor than Tarantino's feature, and very poor editing (that's a good thing). The dialogue is ridiculous as well it should be, and the actors all play their parts perfectly especially McGowan, Rodriguez and a delightfully grim Josh Brolin. Look for Jeff Fahey as a all too typical redneck barbecue chef, Fergie as a random girl and Michael Biehn as the stereotypical sheriff. The ending of 'Planet Terror' is absolutely priceless.
After the gloriously campy 'Planet Terror' ends, we get about a seven minute brick of fake movie trailers. The first is one directed and written by Rob Zombie called 'Werewolf Women of the S.S.', the second is directed by Edgar Wright and the third, the best of the three is Eli Roth's slasher-flick 'Thanksgiving'. It's as tasteless as could be, but it's hysterical and very, very, GRINDHOUSE. There is also a commercial for a fictitious Acuna Boys Mexican Restaurant that had me in stitches.
After this block of trailers end, the second and final feature length grindhouse flick begins -- Quentin Tarantino's 'Death Proof'. I was expecting this to be the highlight of the film, but to my surprise it wasn't. Not to say this isn't a great little film, just that it has some major flaws. The story is typical grindhouse -- a killer preys upon horny and wild young girls. The killer, however, is not typical. He's Stuntman Mike, a scar-faced middle-aged tough guy who drives a creepy-looking black 1970 Dodge Challenger. He preys upon unsuspecting young girls getting them to trust him, then he one way or another brutally slaughters them with his car sporting a sh__t-eating grin across his face. Despite the lead being a male it's a predominantly female cast and the girls are played by a wide array of unknown actresses except for Rosario Dawson. The acting highlight is obviously Kurt Russell who gives perhaps the best performance of both films. He goes from his tired old clichéd usual role as the rough but honorable good guy, to a stone-cold deranged psycho who derives pleasure out of young girl's suffering. Occasionally he will look directly into the camera and either smile or laugh a haunting chuckle -- HELLS YES! The other highlight in the cast is sassy sistah, so to speak, Tracie Thoms whom you may remember as Joanne from 2005's film adaptation of RENT. Thoms delivers her spunky profanity-laced lines perfectly. Tarantino's dialogue is consistently excellent, but the problem is there is just too much of it. Too much of 'Death Proof' lags with the sometimes pointless and unrelated conversations shared between the different groups of girls. The pace really speeds up during the last half hour of the picture, with a mind-boggling car chase sequence with a twist. The ending is in my mind the better of the two pictures because of how cheesy, random and yes, grindhouse, it is. It will have you cheering, "GIRL POWER!!!", or perhaps just sitting quietly in the theater like most people.
All in all 'Grindhouse' is a must-see experience. It's by far the most interesting film in theaters now and possibly the best. It kicks 300 square in the balls with it's sheer originality and awesomeness. Both Rodriguez and Tarantino do marvelous jobs directing and writing, and so do most of the filmmakers of the short fake trailers (minus Edgar Wright). If you want to see something more different than anything you've ever seen before and you think ya got the grapes, head on down to the cinemas and catch GRINDHOUSE. Grade: A-