Grindhouse Double Feature

[Shinokamen]

I recently bought both films of the Grindhouse double feature. I first purchased Death Proof, because I enjoy the rest of Tarantino's films, and I then bought Planet Terror a few days later. I enjoyed them both, but I liked Planet Terror more because it had more plot to it (even though it had a few problems, e.g. how did she fire her gun???).

If Tarantino had just fleshed out the Stuntman Mike character more, the film would have been excellent, in my opinion.

Thoughts about either film?

[Mandrake]

Absolutely terrible.

I'd been looking forward to Grindhouse because I love Tarantino flicks and I (mistakenly) thought Planet Terror was about zombies--which are forever cool--so I purchased my ticket with enthusiasm. That enthusiasm was tragically cut short when I realized that Planet Terror was not the homage to George Romero I imagined it to be but was instead a steaming pile of crap. Be warned that minor spoilers may follow.

Planet Terror goes beyond campiness and into the realm of the retarded. It's tries real hard to be "so bad it's good" but puts so much emphasis on being "bad" (and dude, the machine gun peg-leg is the least of its problems) that it never achieves the "good". It's an extremely self-conscious attempt at recreating 70's style B-grade action/horror flicks. The missing reel gags tried to be cute but they end up expending what little patience the audience might still have. Simply put, don't obliterate important story points for the sake of a cheap joke.

Deathproof is a superior movie but that's not saying much. It starts out well enough. Tarantino, who always understood that character was itself action, introduces characters and keeps them interesting with his typical style of dialogue. It plods along at a steady although somewhat slow pace but lets you know that it's going somewhere. Then the movie seemingly climaxes with the abruptness of a brick to the teeth and.... starts over again? At this point it just becomes tedious and if you were in the theatre that night, having just sat through stupid Planet Terror you didn't have any patience left for these kind of games. The movie ends in a pretty crappy way, the credits roll and whoever's still watching groans in relief and gets the hell out.

So yeah, Grindhouse... not a fan.

[Jake_Ellison]

Only watched the Tarantino half (Deathproof), because he always finds a way to come up with something visually spectacular, and he has interesting characters.

I don't see how you could complain about it. It was exactly what one would expect from a Tarantino movie (as far as quality and message, of course, the content itself always something new and interesting). I highly recommend it, especially if you liked Kill Bill Vol. 1.

I found it better than the second Kill Bill.

P.S. Looking forward to his World War 2 movie. I'm sure it's gonna be just like Shindler's List