First Film Review by the Count: Grindhouse (2007.dir.Quentin Tarantino and Robert Rodriguez)

The definition of the term "Grindhouse" is that of an old rundown American cinema that would usually show exploitation/horror films with extreme sexual content from the 1970's to early 1980's. Examples of such films include The Last House on the Left and Cannibal Holocaust both of which have managed to gain cult status with fans worldwide. The Grindhouse cinemas suddenly just disappeared in the middle of the 1980's and were completely forgotten about for nearly 22 years. This was because people were completely shocked by the extremeness of the films shown. But let's face the facts, they were terrible films with the exception of The Last House on the Left. In the United Kingdom, some Hammer Horror Productions were shown in our equivalent of a Grindhouse known as a Fleapit.


Now for my review. In 2007 the film Grindhouse was set up by film director Quentin Tarantino who is a known fan of Grindhouse Cinema as well as other genres of films like Spaghetti Westerns and Hong Kong Action Cinema. Tarantino teamed with Spaghetti Western film director Robert Rodriguez, to have two films and some fake trailers for films that don't exist, all to be put into one long massive explosive homage/tribute to Grindhouse. First would be director Robert Rodriguez' film Planet Terror and then Quentin Tarantino's film Death Proof followed by the fake trailers in the middle. Both films were to be shot in the style of Grindhouse so the cinematography would be jumpy, scratchy and even a missing reel was in on purpose put in Planet Terror. Both films were box-office bombs and met with mixed critical reception.


Planet Terror involves a group of people who aim to escape a zombie plague which is caused when nearby Military officials accidently release a deadly toxin/gas that turns all the local townspeople into pus and blood ridden zombies  who stop at nothing to kill people. Now that is pretty basic Grindhouse plot as usually there wouldn't be much plot to these films in the first place but let us not be mistaken this doesn't make it a very good film. The acting in this film does a lot to help itself because you have Bruce Willis playing the twisted Lieutenant and Naveen Andrews playing a sinister scientist who for some reason chops people's testicles off if they don't comply with him. There was only one actor who I thought was wasting his talent and I'm sad to say that it was Josh Brolin as the menacing doctor who treats the infected townspeople. Josh Brolin should  know better than to  than to star in this film while also proving his talent in No Country for Old Men in the same year. The best thing that anyone could say about Planet Terror is that is a very honest film because it doesn't release itself from it's premise which is trying to remain a successful tribute to Grindhouse with cheap wooden acting and being a badly written film. It's success is because it doesn't pretend to be something it isn't and I believe that Robert Rodriguez has created a good homage because it is for most people who were around back during Grindhouse, as if they were re-visiting the bad past but in a good way. It is neither a good film or a bad film but it carries out the mission employed by Tarantino. 


On the other hand Quentin Tarantino's homage Death Proof is anything but an honest film. It's basic plot is about a sadist who goes around killing women with his allegedly "Death Proof " car. When I saw  this film I couldn't actually mentally imagine how Quentin Tarantino the man who created Kill Bill and Pulp Fiction could drag himself down to this, a boring and confusing film with nothing that could be describe as honest or at least attempting to execute what had been Tarantino's initiative. Tarantino appears in the film briefly as a bartender but fails to deliver his lines as everyone else in the film talks like Quentin Tarantino which means that other actors are better at doing Quentin than Quentin is as himself. The Sadist is portrayed by Kurt Russell, a veteran actor famous for Escape from New York and Poseidon. Now funnily enough, Kurt Russell is not a bad actor and in Death Proof he gives a dark and quietly sinister performance as Stuntman Mike, the Sadist. I enjoyed watching  Kurt Russell in this film but I really didn't care much for any of the rest. On terms of Honesty this film goes from Drama to Horror to Thriller and then descending into Action at the end where we have a large car chase completely ripped off from the film Vanishing Point. I suppose that Tarantino wants to use motives and themes from other films just to make his own films. This part I thought was the weakest end of Grindhouse.


If there was anything I did like out of the film it was the fake trailers. I thought that they were right in the style of Grindhouse Cinema because they looked just like what I had imagined or wanted to imagine right from the start. The trailers were for films that don't exist and they included: Machete, Don't, Thanksgiving and Werewolf Women of the SS. I was pleased to see that Don't was created by Edgar Wright whose films Hot Fuzz and Shaun of the Dead I have treasured ever since I first saw them. Don't was just in the style of the Hammer productions being played in the British Fleapit. The rest were interesting apart from Werewolf Women of the SS which I thought was really letting the side down because of it's unrealism. Machete was constructed into a feature film in 2010 by Robert Rodriguez. Thanksgiving was another good piece of work by Eli Roth, the director of Hostel and Cabin Fever, however this does not make up for his work in Death Proof.




I will give Grindhouse 2/4 stars.


This was my review of Grindhouse and you catch all of the Count's reviews in due time.