Quentin Tarantino is back, and if you thought he had exorcised the spirit of exploitation cinema from his soul with the \u201cKill Bill\u201d films, well, think again. His latest project is \u201cGrindhouse,\u201d a double-feature homage to sleazy 1970s B-movies, which has him working with friend and fellow director Robert Rodriguez, each offering up a film.<\/p>\n
\u201cGrindhouse cinema\u201d is a term that\u2019s been bandied about more frequently since the release of \u201cKill Bill.\u201d It refers to the run-down, seedy cinemas of the \u201970s, often located in dodgier parts of town, that showed nothing but exploitation flicks, from soft-core sleaze (\u201cValley of the Ultravixens\u201d) to sick-inducing splatter (\u201cThe Corpse Grinders\u201d), blaxploitation (\u201cCoffy\u201d) and sexploitation (\u201cIlsa, She-Wolf of the SS\u201d). The \u201cgrindhouse\u201d nickname derived from the fact that many of these cinemas were striptease clubs in an earlier incarnation.<\/p>\n
Tarantino\u2019s take on this period comes in the form of \u201cDeath Proof,\u201d a bad- girls-vs.-evil-stuntman car-chase flick that plays like some sort of mutant hybrid of \u201970s existential road-movie classic \u201cVanishing Point\u201d and sleaze classic \u201cFaster Pussycat, Kill! Kill!\u201d Rodriguez, for his part, came up with \u201cPlanet Terror,\u201d a trashy zombie-splatter flick featuring a go-go dancer with a machinegun leg.<\/p>\n
Both men are no strangers to exploitation cinema \u2014 see \u201cFrom Dusk Till Dawn,\u201d for one \u2014 but what\u2019s different here is the obsessive, maniacal extent to which they attempt to duplicate the grindhouse cinema experience. Aside from the texture of the film itself \u2014 which literally screams \u201970s \u2014 the reels are deliberately scratched, stained, wobbly and otherwise messed up. There\u2019s even a \u201cmissing reel\u201d in Rodriguez\u2019 film. And between the two films are some delightfully trashy (and fake) trailers by Eli Roth, Edgar Wright, Rob Zombie and Rodriguez that perfectly duplicate the cheap and over-the-top pleasures of the period.<\/p>\n
Tarantino, in an interview with The Japan Times this month, discussed how the project came to be. \u201cI have a really big print collection at home, and I have a really nice theater,\u201d says the director. \u201cIt\u2019s one of the things I did when I \u2018got rich.\u2019 That year I didn\u2019t make a movie, I made a movie theater. And so I have movie nights at my house where I show these really cool grindhouse movies and stuff. And Robert would come over, and he\u2019d always have a really great time. And he said: \u2018Y\u2019know, these movies are so much fun! We should do our own version of this. Let\u2019s give the world what it\u2019s like at movie night at Quentin\u2019s house.\u2019 So that\u2019s what we tried to do.\u201d<\/p>\n
Tarantino, as legend had it, spent a lot of time slumming in East L.A. cinemas soaking up grindhouse. (Though he may have been one of the few people watching the movies \u2014 grindhouses were notorious for attracting dopers, dealers, whores, tricks, cruisers and the mentally infirm.) He recalls how, in those days, \u201cWe saw a lot of bad movies. I\u2019ve never been of the \u2018so-bad-it\u2019s-good\u2019 school. Very rarely was it so bad it was good. You hoped for the best, and you bought your ticket, and then in 5 minutes you\u2019re like, \u2018Oh, yuck, Jesus f**king Christ!\u2019 . . . But then you go see Joe Dante\u2019s \u2018Piranha,\u2019 written by John Sayles, and all of a sudden, \u2018Hey! This is a good \u201cJaws\u201d ripoff!\u2019 Back then it seemed really good because you weren\u2019t expecting it. Stephen King had a line about this, right on the mone