PT was awesome DP was boring

Rating: 8/10 (20 April 2007)

In the beginning of Planet Terror, I thought it might be too gratuitously repulsive to be enjoyable (e.g., the swollen, oozing blisters, sliced testicles, etc), but as it went on I fell in love with the madness of it, especially what happens with Rose McGowan's leg. So stupid it was beautiful, a great, hilarious ride... Standing alone, I would give it a 9 or 10.
And the fake trailers were brilliant.
Then comes Death Proof, where I nearly crawled out of my skin with boredom. In prior films Tarantino has excelled at writing and directing scenes of random, seemingly pointless dialogue. But this was taken way too far this time.
However, my biggest complaint was the high speed chase, where the New Zealand stunt woman was riding on the hood of the car, as Kurt Russell attempts to run them off the road. I couldn't help but think, why don't they just stop, so she can get off the hood, and into the relative safety of the car? There was no reason to keep speeding along, smashing into each other. I supposed this is supposed to be dumb fun, but it was too much DUMB, and not enough FUN (as opposed to Planet Terror, where the exact opposite dumb-fun ratio prevailed). The only good thing about Death Proof was the feeling of release at the end -- partially due to the bad guy getting what was coming to him, and partially due to a feeling of gratitude that the film was finally over! Standing alone, I would give this one a 4 or 5.