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Movie Reviews
Grindhouse
Dimension Films
Rated NR
Now Showing at: most major theaters.
Review by: Larry Thomas
If you're not familiar with the term "grindhouse," it refers
to a type of movie theatre that no longer exists. During World War II, second
and third shift workers needed entertainment. So some theatres near defense plants
and in major metropolitan areas began showing films on an almost 24-hour basis.
In the process, they would use up to twelve different films a week, and were said
to be "grinding it out." Beginning in the 1970s, the term was applied
to mostly urban, run-down theatres that specialized in showing kung fu, horror,
sci-fi, and blaxploitation releases. While these films were constantly absent
from award nominations lists, and were designed for an audience of less-than-refined
sensibilities, they did, and still do, have a fan base.
Their current champions are directors Robert Rodriguez and Quentin Tarantino
who have embraced the genres, and are honoring the films they grew up with,
in Grindhouse. It's a full-tilt action-packed double feature
complete with trailers, and the prints have been altered to look like they would
have in a real 70s grindhouse... scratched, speckled, splicy, and worse.
There's one scene where the film seems to break and melt in the projector
gate.
The program begins with a fake trailer for Machete, a south of the
border shoot-em-up with Danny Trejo as an undercover cop, and Cheech Marin as
his priest brother, on a rampage of vengeance.
The first feature in Grindhouse is from Robert Rodriguez, the multi-talented
filmmaker of Desperado and From Dusk Til Dawn. He generally
writes, directs, edits, photographs, and composed the music for his films. In
Planet Terror, a biological weapon is released into the atmosphere
and turns the populace into festering, flesh-eating zombies. In the best grindhouse
tradition, Planet Terror has elements of Night of the Living Dead,
Assault of Precint 13, Motel Hell, The Terminator
and at least a dozen other films woven into its tight ninety minute running
time. The cast is packed with B-movie regulars, such as Michael Parks, Michael
Biehn, Jeff Fahey, and Josh Brolin, as well as more contemporary actors like
Rose McGowan, Marley Shelton and Freddie Rodriguez. The "money shot"... if
you will... occurs when heroine McGowan loses a leg to the zombies, and is
fitted with a machine gun prosthetic, which she uses to mow down the marauding
humanoids. Planet Terror is gory, icky, lowbrow, action-packed and
very, very funny.
Next comes three more fake trailers for horror films titled Thanksgiving,
Don't, and the most outrageous of the bunch, Werewolf Women of the
S.S..
The Quentin Tarantino half of the double feature is Death Proof, a
send-up of all the car chase movies that were popular in that era, with several
overt references to the revered 1970 classic Vanishing Point. In Death
Proof, Stunt Man Mike is a psycho killer whose weapon of choice is his
car. He preys on young women in groups of three or four. Until the day he picks
on the wrong bunch. Playing totally against image, an uglied-up, scar-faced
Kurt Russell is terrific as Stunt Man Mike. As the table-turning ladies, Rosario
Dawson, Tracy Toms, and real-life New Zealand stuntwoman Zoe Bell, are all excellent.
The standout star turn of the piece is from Sydney Poitier. That's Sydney
with a "y," and yes, she's his daughter, and she plays a hard-edged,
hard-partying morning D.J. in Austin. She's both gorgeous and talented,
and this will hopefully be her ticket to the big time. The only major flaw in
the whole experience is that about halfway through Death Proof, Tarantino
goes off into a slow zone, with way too much dialogue. But it's short-lived,
and once the film gets it's motor running, and gets out on the highway,
it delivers the hard-charging goods. And in both films, as in many of their
1970s counterparts, the strong characters here are the women. They are the brave,
they are the survivors, they know how to take charge.
Critics and some audience members are bound to complain that Grindhouse
is foul-mouthed, violent, disgusting, unbelievable, and way over the top. Yes
it is... but so were the films it's emulating. Those same naysayers
will also carp that Grindhouse is the result of two little boys playing
with a large moviemaking toy. Yes it is... but doesn't that apply to
many movies today? Where would we be if George Lucas, Steven Spielberg and others
weren't re-enacting the films of their childhood by playing with their
"moviemaking toy?" The only difference is Rodriguez and Tarantino
grew up with different cinematic role models.
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Friday, September 03, 2010 
