Grindhouse: Thoughts

Julia and I caught Grindhouse last night and I feel compelled to offer a few comments. Firstly, Robert Rodriguez turned out a great effort with his guns-and-gore fest, Planet Terror. Robert's got a sound understanding of what makes trash cinema so enjoyable. Planet Terror dishes up the perfect measure of violence so over the top you have to laugh, comical, pustule-squirting gore and troubled, buxom women. I'd swear the cinema management was pumping the scent of tasty barbecue ribs into the theater in order to heighten the experience. I'm serious, the smell of barbecue. See the movie and you'll understand why it makes sense.

Then there's Tarantino's entrant, Death Proof. There's no question that Tarantino can make good films—Pulp Fiction; Reservoir Dogs; even Kill Bill; they're classics—but this time Quentin has let himself go to seed. The output of toils in this instance reflects the character he self-consciously plays in the film: sleazy, lecherous and altogether too self-impressed. Death Proof runs about 45 minutes too long—it's a 90 minute movie—due to forced attempts on Tarantino's behalf to jam in protracted scenes of his now-famous dialog and a general incoherence of the plot—what are the drivers motivations? Why should we care about Jungle Julia and her slutty cohorts? Ultimately Death Proof plays like a mildly amusing, and admittedly viscerally enjoyable, female revenge masturbation fantasy of a tired, old man. I expected more.