Grindhouse

[bloop]

Now that a few of us have seen it, I need to discuss.  What did you think of the fake trailers?  The apparently real trailer for "Machete"?  Which of the two films did you like more?  How would you rate them individually and as a whole?

Go off on your own tangent if you like, but I need to get my Grindhouse discussion on.

I'll add here that if you haven't seen it, and you think you can take the violence, it's well worth seeing according to 4 of the 4 pholks on the film journals.  It's doing poorly at the box office, and really deserves a better reception, IMO.  The irony, I guess, is that in imitating the B-movies of the 70s, it may have rendered itself a B movie with a budget.

(I noticed that "Death Proof" will be in competition at Cannes)

[PopePouri]

I didn't like Thanksgiving. The rest were great. Nicolas Cage as Fu Manchu was worth the price of admission.

I give the trailers 8/10

Planet Terror 6.5/10

and Death Proof 9/10

It's not really a movie but an experience. I gave it 8/10

[bloop]

First, I guess I'll do the trailers:

"Machete" was hilarious, especially Cheech as the priest - and the completely unnecessary breast shot that came out of nowhere made me laugh.  I will watch this movie when it's really released.

"Planet Terror" was a very good zombie movie send-up.  I liked the woozy and off-kilter nature of the picture, as well as the positively ridiculous one-liners.  Disgusting, but very alive, so I rather liked it, probably more than you did.  I think it was trying to be pretty bad, and succeeded in being entertaining at least.

I wish there was a real intermission here.  I kind of needed to pee through all of the latter half.

"Don't" was the fake trailer highlight for me.  Loved it in all its escalating absurdity.


"Werewolf Women of the S.S." would only be ok if not for Cage's cameo.  That elevates it quite a bit.

"Thanksgiving" really seems like it could have been made then, with the ridiculous Holiday tie-in.  "White meat, dark meat.  All will be carved", lines like that cracked me up.  It was pretty oppressively gross, though.

"Death Proof" was the better of the two movies, with the patented Tarantino dialog and far better performances.  The car chase was among the best I've seen in any movie.  I honestly didn't know Kurt Russell was as capable an actor as he is here, but I thought the Aussie (heh), Zoe Bell, was the outstanding performance here.  I find it interesting to think about whether Tarantino played with time in this movie or not, but I took it as he didn't.  The ending would be just a little depressing to think he's going to get up from that and kill those other girls.

"Death Proof" (9.5 A+)
"Planet Terror" (7.5 B+)

As a whole experience, it was executed to near-perfection, so I gave it an A overall.  I'm still not sure if I should split the films or think of it as one for the purposes of the film journal.

[AldaForPresident]

I love Machete, Don't, and Thanksgiving. I totally agree about Werewold Women of the S.S. being mediocre except for Cage. That did crack me up. But Thanksgiving was my favorite overall.

I loved both movies, and I can't see spliting them up. I don't like the idea at all.

Death Proof is definitely a better film, and I think I it edges out Planet Terror but I love them both so much. I think I laughed harder at the absurdity of Planet Terror, of course, but Death Proof has such great characters all around- I think I actually might've liked the first group of girls better, but I agree that Zoe Bell had the best performance. They were all great, though.

I tend to rate movies based on how much I enjoyed them, and I gave Grindhouse an A+. I would really like to see it again before it leaves theaters (which might be soon due to its poor box office performance, which makes me sad).

[bloop]

Death Proof has such great characters all around- I think I actually might've liked the first group of girls better, but I agree that Zoe Bell had the best performance. They were all great, though.

Hm - interesting.  I really liked Jungle Julia (Poitier - now that's class), almost as much as Zoe, but I liked the ensemble and chemistry with the second group of girls.

I thought it was pretty cool that he used an actual stunt double (from Kill Bill among other things) for the part of Zoe, and that said stunt double actually has some potential as a lead.

[PopePouri]

There was actually one more trailer than was only shown in Canada called Hobo with a Shotgun.

You can watch it here:
http://www.myspace.com/hobowithashotgun 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hobo_with_a_shotgun

[bloop]

Yeah, Canada had some kind of grindhouse trailer contest - pretty cool.  Of course, it would be even cooler if the film did well at the box office, but I understand that some find their movies too violent, while others just grow to be too cool for that kind of thing, preferring more considered, artful directors than Tarantino like, say, Gore Verbinski.    

The different trailers by different directors made me think that it would be pretty neat if they made subsequent grindhouse double features with completely different directors, cast, etc.  I wouldn't want to run the concept into the ground, but I think it would be interesting for a couple cycles more.

I hope the Cannes cut of "Death Proof" makes the DVD in some form.

[AldaForPresident]

The different trailers by different directors made me think that it would be pretty neat if they made subsequent grindhouse double features with completely different directors, cast, etc.  I wouldn't want to run the concept into the ground, but I think it would be interesting for a couple cycles more.

I think that would be awesome. In an Entertainment Weekly cover story, Tarantino and Rodriguez said that's what they would like to see as well, but that was before the movie released and didn't do very well, which still depresses me. I do hope it comes out on DVD soon.

I hope the Cannes cut of "Death Proof" makes the DVD in some form.

Word. It has to!