Grindhouse (Tarantino/Rodriguez, 2007)

[DrewReiber]

The extra footage are probably just the "missing reels" re-instated, so they get the entire films instead of the truncated theatrical edits.

[Narshty]

And the fan trailers start pouring in. I must say, Hobo with a Shotgun is magnificent.

[Oedipax]

I must say, Hobo with a Shotgun is magnificent.

Definitely the best title since Snakes on a Plane, and if they were able to keep up the promise of the trailer, a much more enjoyable film, too.

[domino harvey]

I must say, Hobo with a Shotgun is magnificent.

some amazing writing at work here
"We're taking a car ride to hell and you're riding shotgun"
"He's cashing in his nickels and dimes" =D>

[Dylan]

Found this via a film score message board:

[quote]Author: Paul Heath

The soundrack to Quentin Tarantino segment of the new double-header flick GRINDHOUSE will hit stores from April 3rd.

Here's the official release from Maverick Records.

Death Proof is Acclaimed Film Director Tarantino's Highly-Anticipated Half of Exploitation Double-Feature Grindhouse

Burbank, CA — Maverick Records will release the soundtrack to Death Proof — Quentin Tarantino's half of the new exploitation movie double feature Grindhouse — on April 3rd, three days before the two films hit theaters on April 6th. The second film, Planet Terror, was directed by Robert Rodriguez. In between the two features, trailers advertising fake films, directed by Eli Roth and Rob Zombie, among others, will be shown.

Death Proof follows Austin's hottest DJ, Jungle Julia (Sydney Tamiia Poitier) as she sets out into the night to unwind with her two friends Shanna (Jordan Ladd) and Arlene (Vanessa Ferlito). Covertly tracking their moves is Stuntman Mike (Kurt Russell), a scarred rebel leering from behind the wheel of his muscle car, revving just feet away.

The soundtrack includes classic songs from the '60s and '70s, such as “Jeepsterâ€

[Antoine Doinel]

As much as I'm looking forward to Grindhouse, I already can't stomach Tarantino's interviews regarding the film. It's nauseating how much he goes on and on about "orginality" in the final paragraph - and how the only film he wouldn't "die" for is Jackie Brown (ironically, IMO, his best film). Also, his whole take on violence being the most cinematic thing you can do on camera sounds like it was written by a teenager.

Oh yeah, and director's don't get better as they get older? Perhaps he should have a conversation with Clint Eastwood.

Someone really needs to humble this guy:

[quote]From The Sunday Times
March 04, 2007
I call the shots here
Who says the film studios rule the roost? Not Quentin Tarantino. If you're a true artist, you can do whatever you want

Ever since I can remember, I've wanted to be involved in movies. I didn't know what a director was; I just knew they were the only thing I gave a damn about.

My favourite movie when I was a little, little boy was Bud Abbott and Lou Costello Meet Frankenstein. It's very funny when Abbott and Costello are around, but when they're gone, it's actually played very straight. I remember having the thought: “These are the best movies ever! When it's supposed to be funny, it's really funny, and when it's supposed to be scary, it's really scary. I can't believe they make movies like this!â€

[sevenarts]

As much as I'm looking forward to Grindhouse, I already can't stomach Tarantino's interviews regarding the film. It's nauseating how much he goes on and on about "orginality" in the final paragraph - and how the only film he wouldn't "die" for is Jackie Brown (ironically, IMO, his best film).

I like Tarantino, but it really annoys me how much he takes his own press to heart, and it seems to have led to him rejecting his best movie -- I totally agree on Jackie Brown -- because it wasn't commercially successful enough. Kill Bill was lots of fun, and Grindhouse looks to be more of the same, but after this I'd like to see him go back in the more mature direction he was going with JB, and it probably won't happen because he doesn't want another flop. On the flipside, he's also really taken the positive press about his other films to heart; is there any more conceited director around?

[scalesojustice]

amatuer status indeed. and that was really hard to read. i was looking forward to grindhouse in the sense that it is such a complete reference to a dead genre, that i wouldn't have to worry about Tarantino spouting off about originality. that we finally reached the point where both tarantino and the audience knows he's ripping off other movies. like titling pulp fiction "french new wave" or kill bill "spaghetti western meets kung fu."

apparently that's not the case. if "death proof" is the second film in grindhouse, i might just leave after "planet terror" and the trailers between the two. "planet terror" looks like more fun anyway and if i leave half way through, i still have seen a 90 minute film for my money.

[DrewReiber]

i was looking forward to grindhouse in the sense that it is such a complete reference to a dead genre, that i wouldn't have to worry about Tarantino spouting off about originality. that we finally reached the point where both tarantino and the audience knows he's ripping off other movies. like titling pulp fiction "french new wave" or kill bill "spaghetti western meets kung fu."

I've been telling people that's exactly what he does for years. A lot of people still don't realize this is what he *thinks* he's doing, because he doesn't truly understand the aesthetics of the material he regurgitates or even why those films existed in the first place. He just reads the surface of those films and then re-mixes elements of them without context while labeling himself just as critical as the original work. It's not only preposterious, but it's denegrating to the goals and accomplishments of the filmmakers who preceeded him.

For someone who talks about how much worse directors get when they become older, it fascinates me that Seijun Suzuki's last 17 years of filmmaking is still lightyears ahead of most directors in his field and yet Tarantino is *STILL* reusing script and visuals from Suzuki's mid-60's work down to the dialogue and production design *exactly*. How's that for ignorant and disrespectful? Paraphrasing Jonathan Rosenbaum, Tarantino's new Godard is just the old Godard. I say all you need to do is simply insert whichever director from 30-40 years ago is most appropriate.

if "death proof" is the second film in grindhouse, i might just leave after "planet terror" and the trailers between the two. "planet terror" looks like more fun anyway and if i leave half way through, i still have seen a 90 minute film for my money.

That's what most of my friends and I are considering doing. We're only giving it a shot because of Kurt Russell. I'm glad Tarantino is trying to get people to pay attention to genres I'm very passionate about, but it's not helping that he's a hack who buys into his own press.

[Antoine Doinel]

New trailer.

[Dear Catastrophe Totoro]

He just reads the surface of those films and then re-mixes elements of them without context while labeling himself just as critical as the original work. It's not only preposterious, but it's denegrating to the goals and accomplishments of the filmmakers who preceeded him.

This was more or less what I wanted to say with all that "definitive" crap.

For someone who talks about how much worse directors get when they become older, it fascinates me that Seijun Suzuki's last 17 years of filmmaking is still lightyears ahead of most directors in his field and yet Tarantino is *STILL* reusing script and visuals from Suzuki's mid-60's work down to the dialogue and production design *exactly

And yet, he manages to misplace the subversion of Suzuki's films entirely.

[Antoine Doinel]

The spinoffs are already being planned. From JoBlo:

Machete goes solo? Mar. 12, 2007

Source: Cinemablend by: Dave Davis

The SXSW festival is underway, and Austinite maverick Robert Rodriguez is giving lucky attendees a healthy injection of GRINDHOUSE goodies (the rest of us chumps have to wait til the flick hits next month).

A nice meaty scoop among Rodriguez's Q&A responses is that he's already planning a straight-to-DVD spinoff featuring MACHETE, one of the faux trailers sandwiched between the two GRINDHOUSE flicks. The trailer stars RR collaborator and lovable thug Danny Trejo as an assassin and ladies man (yes, Danny Trejo) who wears a leather trenchcoat that holds about a hundred machetes, and drives a massive street hog motorcycle with a chaingun mounted on the front.

This doesn't come as that much of a shock -- Rodriguez and Tarantino have been remarkably enthusiastic about taking the GRINDHOUSE theme in different directions, but only one of the pair probably has the focus to follow through, so we might get a MACHETE movie after all. Hell, Rodriguez probably shot it already.

Rodriguez also announced the winners of the "Make Your Own GRINDHOUSE Trailer" contest, and while my personal favorite CONG OF THE DEAD didn't place, it's hard to argue with HOBO WITH A SHOTGUN.

[DrewReiber]

Ever since I told a friend of mine about the Machete trailer I saw at San Diego last year, his antipication for Grindhouse has been building. After the Spike Awards ran part of it on TV, he declared that he wanted a Machete movie more than anything. Needless to say, this bit of news has made him pretty ecstatic. I definitely look forward to hearing more.

[Fletch F. Fletch]

Salon.com reports on a presentation of Rodriguez's segment from Grindhouse shown at SXSW:

As far as what's actually showing on those screens, SXSW is always a defiantly mixed bag. Nothing was more fun this weekend than the movie we didn't get to see. Rodriguez showed us a splatter-laden zombie car chase from "Terror Planet," the faux-'70s exploitation pic that makes up his half of "Grindhouse," and I for one found it completely irresistible. Those who believe that retro-cultural concoctions like "Grindhouse" are ironic, or even campy, are missing the point. As Rodriguez and Knowles made clear, they're geeks' geeks, and their affection -- nay, their adoration -- for the high-concept trash cinema of another age is completely genuine.

Making a film in the grindhouse style, Rodriguez insisted, was not a postmodern affectation but an embrace of freedom. "What really excites me about grindhouse films is that they had to be about ideas," he said. "They didn't have stars in the cast. They didn't have budgets. They had to rely on outrageous ideas and lurid material to get people in the seats. We've got stars in our cast -- and that's kind of weird -- but we're using them the way we would if we didn't."

As you probably know if you care about these things, "Grindhouse" is meticulously constructed to re-create a filmgoing experience that most of its prospective audience probably never had.

Rodriguez's "Terror Planet" will have digitally created scratches, splices, water damage and dye leakage; perversely, since Tarantino's segment (a cars 'n' guns flick called "Death Proof") is actually shot on film, such manipulation will be harder. In between the two "features," we'll see trailers for nonexistent coming attractions; Rodriguez showed us Eli Roth's unbelievably gruesome trailer for a Thanksgiving-themed slasher pic that's horrifying, hilarious and guaranteed not to pass muster with the MPAA. (Wait for the DVD, I guess.)

[THX1378]

Did anyone watch the making of that came on FX after The Riches last night? It's replaying this Sunday night but is it worth it to record it?

[Fletch F. Fletch]

Another report from SXSW.

[Antoine Doinel]

It looks like the studio and the MPAA are in for a rough ride in getting this to an R-rating. From Page Six:

March 15, 2007 -- THE people who dole out ratings at the Motion Picture Assn. of America just might flip out when they see "Grindhouse," Quentin Tarantino and Robert Rodriguez's tribute to the ultraviolent, nudity-drenched pictures that once screened 'round the clock in the grungy movie palaces of 42nd Street.

The Weinstein Company, which is releasing the picture April 6 through its Dimension Films arm, needs an R rating for the flick to get into mainstream theaters. But, "some of it is so graphic and outrageous for a major Hollywood studio, there's no question it's headed for an NC-17 without big cuts," says a Page Six operative, who got a sneak peek at the most over-the-top footage.

"Grindhouse" is actually two short movies - one directed by Tarantino, the other by Rodriguez - with an intermission between them. During the break, a series of fake trailers will be shown for such fictitious titles as "Werewolf Women of the SS," directed by Rob Zombie.

"In one scene, a cute, topless girl is roughly tied down on a table by evil female Nazi experimenters who begin draining her blood and, as she screams in agony, they brand her like livestock with a coal-hot steel swastika," our source said. "And every girl in the Nazi concentration camp is topless."

Another trailer, directed by Eli Roth, of "Hostel" fame, is called "Thanksgiving," in which a town's celebration of Turkey Day is interrupted by a mad slasher.

"There's a part where Jordan Ladd [daughter of Cheryl Ladd of 'Charlie's Angels'] is in a car with her boyfriend and giving him [oral sex] when she lovingly reaches to stroke his hair and discovers his neck is just a bloody stump - some maniac had just cut off his head while she was in the act."
Later, a frisky cheerleader climbs onto a trampoline and begins stripping naked as she jumps up and down until she does a split and her skirt blows up without panties underneath. "You get the full 'Britney Spears-getting-out-of-the-limo view,' " our source says. Another jolting scene shows a grossly obese man chewing on a baby.

How much of these moviegoers will end up seeing is anybody's guess. "Some cuts definitely will have to be made. There's no question," conceded one studio insider. A Dimension rep declined comment.

[leo goldsmith]

"In one scene, a cute, topless girl is roughly tied down on a table by evil female Nazi experimenters who begin draining her blood and, as she screams in agony, they brand her like livestock with a coal-hot steel swastika," our source said. "And every girl in the Nazi concentration camp is topless."

I salute you, Mr. Zombie.

[Cinesimilitude]

A fat man chewing on a baby?

I am so going to be under the influence when I watch these films for the first time. I can't wait.

[toiletduck!]

A fat man chewing on a baby?

I actually had to read that twice for it to sink in -- the first time through went something along the lines of "grossly obese? chewing on baby? yep, everything checks out here."

Goodness, what does that say about me?

But I eventually went back and reread and gave it the hearty laugh it deserves. And what does that say about me?

-Toilet Dcuk

[Cinesimilitude]

But I eventually went back and reread and gave it the hearty laugh it deserves. And what does that say about me?

It doesn't say anything negative about you in the context of the film's aim and content. If you laughed the same way while reading an article that told of an obese man who ate a baby... Unfortunately, reading said article after seeing the film may recall the scene, causing you to laugh at the film around an uninformed group of people (Entertaining, but problematic, to be sure). I myself was still laughing heartily from the ""And every girl in the Nazi concentration camp is topless" bit.

[scalesojustice]

i would actually respect the film if they took the NC-17 rating and ran with it, wouldn't that be true grind house?

[Jeff]

Since they split from Disney, The Weinstein Company is not an MPAA signatory and they can release the film unrated. They would be wise to do so. Newspapers, theaters, and video stores are more likely to carry and promote the film than if it goes out with an NC-17. Besides that, Blockbuster refuses to stock NC-17 films, but will stock unrated ones. Since the Weinsteins signed that stupid exclusivity deal with them, that will probably be pretty important.

[Antoine Doinel]

[quote]For Immediate Release:

WHO: QUENTIN TARANTINO, KURT RUSSELL and cast members from the upcoming film GRINDHOUSE

WHAT: Quentin Tarantino, Kurt Russell, Zoe Bell, Sydney Tamiia Poitier, Tracie Thoms (“Cold Case, “Devil Wears Pradaâ€

[Antoine Doinel]

The women of Grindhouse do Maxim.

In other news Fergie (as in that horrible pop singer) is in this? Ugh. Yet another reason I'm not particularly anticipating Tarantino's film.