Grindhouse opens today. I’ve been surprised by people I know who are eager to see this movie. I’m not sure if it’s legitimate love for the work of Quentin Tarantino and Robert Rodriguez or if it’s unfamiliarity with the subject matter.
The movie attempts to replicate a typical moviegoing experience from the Seventies, with a double feature of exploitation films, plus coming attractions for other like movies. Yes, Kurt Russell is in it, but it’s not the Kurt of Sky High (2005) and Executive Decision (1996), but the Kurt who collaborated with John Carpenter on Escape from New York (1981), The Thing (1982) and Big Trouble in Little China (1986).
What you get in Grindhouse is a zombie flick (Planet of Terror) from Rodriguez and a combination slasher/chicks-who-get-revenge/car chase flick (Death Proof). You’ll see them referred to as B-movies, but that’s not strictly accurate. B-movies existed in the Thirties and Forties and were lower-budgeted films designed to play on a bill with an “A” picture. Exploitation films existed in a slightly different universe, from less reputable producers, and were designed to provide the sex and violence you couldn’t get from mainstream Hollywood. A Roy Rogers Western is a B-movie. Reefer Madness (1936) is an exploitation film.
See that Grindhouse poster up above? I shot it in a subway station near Times Square in New York City. In the Seventies, Times Square was at its grimiest and it was home to many theaters that played films just like in Grindhouse.
I had access to a copy of the NY Daily News from November 23, 1963. The cover story is JFK’s assassination, but you can also see what was playing in New York that day. You could have seen a mainstream movie like Cleopatra, the infamous flop.
Or you could have gone to see nudie classic Traveling Light, directed by Edward Craven Walker (designer of the lava lamp) under the name Michael Keatering, on a double-bill with The Amorous Sex (originally known as Sweet Beat), a rock movie with nudity added, so you get The Five Satins singing the doo-wop classic “In the Still of the Night” and a topless beauty contestant.
This is the world of Grindhouse. You think a woman with an automatic weapon strapped on in place of her severed leg is weird? I can assure you that there were actual movies made just as outrageous or worse.
Tags: Grindhouse, Robert Rodriguez, Quentin Tarantino, Kurt Russell, John Carpenter, Traveling Light, The Amorous Sex, B-movie, exploitation
2 Responses
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Dan Dorman Says:
I have been reading nothing but semi-bad to mixed reviews about the film. Frankly, this is not the type of film that needs to be reviewed positively or even reviewed at all. It’s pop filmmaking by two of Hollywood’s demi-god darlings. Even on DVD the film will score record numbers. Give them what they want: sex and a whole lotta violence. The formula’s worked for years. Does it even matter what genre it’s disguised in?
The bulk of the things I’ve been hearing are that Rodriguez’s half is spot-on. It’s funny and amusing and trashy and gorey and everything that the second half (Tarantino’s) is not. Somebody wrote that if it were any other director who made the second half it would not have even been given the green light. Tarantino thinks that whatever he writes is solid gold and unfortunately, as long as his films keep making money that’s what everybody else will continue to tell him.
I thought Kill Bill was a poorly written (nevermind directed) film. He is now at the phase of recycling his own material. The worst review I read said that Tarantino’s own portion seemed as if someone was trying to copy Tarantino’s style. Bad, bad, bad. Poor Quentin. I’m sure he’s weeping over the bad reviews as he sips martinis at sunset and counts the stacks of hundreds under his mattress.
It seems to me as if the genre these two hotshots are trying to lovingly and painstakingly recreate was never worth the effort in the first place. Plus, if you’re going to call a movie “grindhouse” — make a fucking grindhouse film — not a Quentin Tarantino film. Not to mention somebody already did this a few years ago — Rob Zombie (who directs one of the brilliant mock trailers in the film) with The Devil’s Rejects. That film actually was like seeing a drive-in exploitation film from the seventies — not simply one that pretended to be.
And there’s the rub. The best form of parody (or even homage) is imitation. Of course, I’m sure there are those out there who will say: these films are supposed to be bad, aren’t they? Yes, but not in the way it seems as if the filmmakers don’t know it’s bad.
I will wait for DVD. And I’m not looking forward to it. Think I’ll go watch a Larry Cohen film now. And God told me to…
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Dan Dorman Says:
I have not seen Grindhouse. I am waiting for DVD as I said before. But I do have a few more thoughts on this.
First of all — there is something just plain interesting about watching Tarantino’s work isn’t there? Sometimes it’s like he were writing things for a creative writing class and they were just giving him different scenarios to write in but he kept using the same characters but changing the names. There’s that familiar thread and even if it’s a failure it’s like adding onto the Tarantino mythos or something. It’s mindblowing what this guy can get away with and even I must support the fascination of it all.
Weird. Remember his section of that movie Four Rooms? Same thing. It’s like watching a trainwreck where everyone gets out alive except that they all lose an eye. In other words, it’s mostly harmless but still a shambles.
I don’t know how I feel about Rodriguez. In all honesty, he just keeps getting better. He does everything himself on all of his films. Doesn’t that make him some kind of an auteur? I guess he is. Sin City was great. Prior to that I would have to go back to From Dusk Till Dawn to cite another great work of his. Once Upon a Time in Mexico was fun but it was slight.
I guess what I really want to say here is (and without sounding like too much of an ass for having never seen the film) Grindhouse just looks like a fucking mess. Not the mess it is supposed to be but a jarbled attempt of recycling themes and influences that neither of these two talented (but seriously limited) filmmakers really “get.”
I’ll give you Kill Bill [Vols. 1 & 2] — Tarantino knew EXACTLY what to rip off in that film. The problem lies with what was going on in between the rip-off scenes. It was dull to me. The dialogue uninspired — unlike his previous three films (6 if you count his work as writer only: FDTD, NBK and TR). Kill Bill was just like a big inside joke and I guess I felt that even though I knew the punchline (probably a lot better than most people who actually swear by the film) I just wasn’t in on the joke.
Why is it that while Rodriguez becomes a more technically proficient filmmaker, Tarantino just gets lazier? Does anyone care anymore what he might do with the “Dirty Dozen” war film genre? If anything I’m starting to grit my teeth and fear for him a little. I start to look away from the screen and say to myself: “Boy, that was embarrassing.”
I don’t know. Sometimes you don’t have to think about films. It’s enough that they simply hit you on an emotional level. Then there are great films that do both. But I guess every film can’t be Grand Illusion. The shame is, Pulp Fiction, Reservoir Dogs (and even parts of Jackie Brown) were more than just mindless exercises in genre filmmaking. Jackie Brown was not just a blaxpoitation parody or even an official entry in the genre. It toyed cleverly with all that and became its own thing.
The same can be said of all of Tarantino’s work up until Kill Bill. Kill Bill to me was like anybody’s film. Anyone could have made that. I would even go a step farther and say someone else probably could have done it better.
Still, there’s this feeling that every new Tarantino film is an event. I’m not saying he’s fucking Hitchcock (quite the contrary) but I guess I’m glad he’s out there making films. He’s keeping something alive in the process. He knows his shit — even if he doesn’t know how to call on it every time. Who the hell else even knew who Lawrence Tierney was besides Tarantino let alone put him in a film again?
I guess I like him because he’s NOT a snob. He’s a dork. I just wish he would do something deserving of his enormous talent again. Make me happy to go see a “Tarantino Movie” instead of just tantalized.