Grindhouse: The Manuel's View Review

Jess and I saw Grindhouse on Friday night. We actually saw it at the drive-ins here in town to add to the appeal and style of the movie. As I said before, I am a HUGE Tarantino and Rodriguez fan. So what did I think of the film - or actually the two films since it is basically two films in one? I liked it, but I wasn't in LOVE with it. I did like that there were homages to many of their past films, from the pack of Red Apple cigarettes to the main character in one of the films being named El Rey, to both films having Sherrif Earl McGraw again. Let me review each film seperately.

First was Planet Terror , by Rodriguez, which was a pretty typical zombie film. As I LOVE most zombie films, this was fun. It was bascially a low budget, campy, sci-fi channel type horror film. It was cool seeing Tom Savini, Michael Biehn, and Naveen Andrews getting such cool roles. There were some cool deaths and if you like blood and guts, you won't be disappointed.

Next was Tarantino's Death Proof. Basically, Kurt Russell plays a killer who likes to murder women with his car. The movie can basically be summed up like this. 4 women just talking about random things for about 30 minutes, followed 15 minutes of the main character, then 30 minutes of 4 new women talking about random things, and ending with a 15 minute car chase scene. So, basically, a LOT of talking. But you know, I still liked it. However, if you are not a HUGE Tarantino fan and are not used to his style of movies, I can see you getting bored. It is typical Tarantino style dialouge. In fact, many people drove off(remember, we are at the drive-ins) during the middle of the movie.

There were also some cool fake trailers by some guest directors made for the movie as well that were fairly entertaining. My favorite was for a movie with the always great Danny Trejo called Machete. In fact, Rodriguez, who directed the trailer, said he might consider making this one into a movie on its own. That would be awesome simply because the tagline was, "They just fucked with the wrong Mexican!" Classic!

So overall, I liked the movie. I'll buy the movie. But not my favorite. I liked Reservoir Dogs, Pulp Fiction, Jackie Brown, and the Kill Bill movies better than Death Proof. I liked Desperado, Once Upon a Time in Mexico, and of course, From Dusk til Dawn better than Planet Terror. Disappointed that this is the case? Slightly. But I still enjoyed them and that is all that matters.