Wednesday, November 28, 2007

Review #18 & 19: Grindhouse (2007)

Planet Terror


Cast/Notable Credits:
Robert Rodriguez (Director): Sin City (2005), Spy Kids Trilogy, The Faculty, From Dusk til’ Dawn (1996), Four Rooms (1995), Desperado (1995)

Rose McGowan (Cherry): Deathproof, Jawbreaker (1999), Devil in the Flesh (1998), Phantoms (1998), Scream, Bio-dome (1996), Encino Man (1992), and Charmed T.V. series

Freddy Rodriguez (El Wray): 6 ft Under, Poseidon (2006), Bobby (2006)

Josh Brolin (William Block): Goonies (1985), Mimic (1997), Hollow Man (2000), Into the Blue (2005)

Marley Shelton (Dakota Block): Deathproof, Sin City, Valentine, Sugar & Spice (2001)

Jeff Fahey (JT Hague): Lawnmower Man (1992), Psycho 3 (1986), Darkman 3 (1986)

Michael Biehn (Sheriff Hague): Aliens, Terminator (1984), The Rock (1996), Cherry Falls (2000), Navy Seals (1990), The Abyss (1990)

Bruce Willis (Lt. Muldon): Many, many, many movies

Naveen Andrews (Abby): Sayid from Lost

Stacy Ferguson (Tammy): singer for Black Eyed Peas & “Fergie"

Electra & Elise Avellan (Babysitters): twin girls in Deathproof

Trailer:



Directors Quentin Tariatino and Robert Rodriguez decided to pay tribute to the old 70’s drive inn grindhouse style movie double features. Rodriguez directs the first movie of the double feature, Planet Terror.

Planet Terror is also the better movie of the two movies...by far. So what's the scoop? A military genetic altering human expert goes haywire which leads to zombies taking over a nearby city and then the planet. The townsfolk try to fight off the zombie invasion and in the mean time, a lot of deaths and bullets fly. Hell Yeah!

Villain:

Planet Terror went for the easy slam dunk when it came to the film's villain...zombies. I'm cool with that any day of the week. Zombies rock!

Cast:
Planet Terror featured a big cast...just see the credits list above. Rose looks smokin’ hot. Check her hotness out your self (pictured left). She turns out into a bad ass mother fucker at the end. Michael Biehn plays the local sheriff of the city. I’ve always been a huge fan of him since Aliens. The rest of the cast does a good job, unlike Deathproof.

SFX/Gore:

There was a lot of deaths in Planet Terror. Of course I expected that from a zombie flick. I lost count of deaths in the flick, but honestly I wasn't keeping track of them either.

Planet Terror did feature a lot of gore...as in too much over the top gore. Zombie flicks tend to do this as they dwell on the zombies eating and tearing away at human flesh.

There were good special effects, and explosions for the style and look of the film. Rodriguez brought out the full arsonal when it came to killing zombies. The coolest SFX was Rose's machine gun leg.

TNA:
6 Hot Chicks, 1 sex act (interrupted), 1 set of boobies (in the beginning of the film), there were 2 sets in the Machette trailer at the beginning of the film. Oh yeah, a set of hot looking twins (pictured right).Me likey. Considering it was a zombie flick, they went out of their way to satisfy the viewers. Only if we could get a good set of boobies, not just a flash by, this film would really, really kick some butt.

T.Gun's Take:

Planet Terror was a pretty good zombie flick. I thought it held true to 70’s style of the grindhouse drive inn movies. I also thought it had a kick ass musical score.

One of the things I hated the most about this movie was the interrupted, “lost scene” during the sex scene between Rose & Freddy. It took some balls to stay with, but I didn’t like it. I loved Rose on the stripper pole and her peg-leg gun. Throw in a set of hot twins and flesh eating zombies and we’re havin’ fun.

Misc. Movie Trivia:
-Film opened on April 6, 2007 along with Deathproof and made $25 million at the Box Office ($19.6 opening weekend)
-Original name was Project Terror
-Film's fisrt 30 pages of the script was actually written in 1998



And the second movie...

Deathproof


Cast/Notable Credits:
Quentin Tarantino (Director): If you don't know any of his movies, then you're an idiot

Kurt Russell (Stuntman Mike): Same thing here

Rosario Dawson (Abernathy): Clerks 2 (2005), Men in Black 2 (2002), Sin City (2003), Alexander (2004), Rent (2005)


Vanessa Ferlito (Arlene): Spiderman 2 (2004), Man of the House (2005)


Rose McGowan (Pam):

Jordan Ladd (Shanna): Cabin Fever (2002), Club Dread (2004), Hostel 2 (2007)


Mary Elizabeth Winstead (Lee): Final Destination 3 (2006), Black Christmas (2006), Ring 2 (2005), Sky High (2005)

Deathproof is the second half of the Grindhouse double feature which is directed by Quentin Tariatino. Q.'s contribution to the Grindhouse 70's feel is a movie about a stuntman (Stuntman Mike) which hunts down unsuspecting women to kill them. Stuntman Mike has rebuilt and fortified his stunt car into a death machine on wheels.

Stuntman Mike took the A-Team 101 course and turned his car into a pretty bad *ss "deathproof" car. The driver side of the car has all the safety precautions for wrecks, and the rest of the car...well not so much protected from crashes.

Stuntman Mike lures females into taking rides or lifts and then crashes the car on purpose to kill them. Or he just simply goes into a head on collision course with another car, banking on his reinforced modifications to keep him alive. Odds are definitely on his side.

Villain:

Okay, I was first diggin’ Kurt Russell’s character, Stuntman Mike. At least for the first half of the film. He was creepy with a sick sense of humor. He drove a bad-ass car and looked mean. Then...WHAT HAPPENED?

He totally disappeared after the first act. Fifteen minutes from the end, it’s like the director said, “Oh yeah, we have a kick ass villain. Let’s put him back in the movie and then make him a whiney bitch.” When he did come back in he started off cool, but became a puss running for his life by the end. BOO! Q wasted that character!

Cast:

Only three real hot chicks, the rest were borderline crack whore looking.I'm sorry Jordan Ladd, but her look just didn't do it. Not to mention annoying as hell when they gossiped. Rosiaro Dawson and Vanessa Ferlito had the only real performances.

SFX/Gore:

Six deaths, and a cool car chase sequence. Where the rest of the film sucked, this part was good.

TNA:

There were about five hot chicks in this film. Looking back at it, and knowing the directors of the movie, I got to ask…”Why aren’t there any boobies?” Come on! It’s a horror movie. I give props to the cheerleader outfit and the lap dance scene, but come on'…we need boobies. Look at the hotness below.

Mary Elizabeth Winstead

Jordan Ladd

Rosario Dawson


T.Gun's Take:

Movie pace = suck! Forty seven minutes in and still no deaths. Plus it was painful to watch. So they finally kill some people and now we enter the second half of the film. Another forty plus minutes and still nothing! Somewhere in there was crappy dialog and annoying chicks yapping their flaps. I wasn’t a big fan of the music either. And for Christ sake, pick a style. I know it started with a seventies feel to it and that’s cool and all, but what’s with the 5 minutes of black and white and then into a modern day production style? Most of the movie was painful to begin with, and now they add that on top of it.

I might have graded this movie a little hard. But it was also pretty hard to watch. I thought it had a great idea, and story premise. Unfortunately, I thought both were wasted. Someday I'll get back to it and re-evaluate it. I try not to grade off the first watching, this might have been one of those that suffered because of it.



I did like the car sequence at the end with the lesbian on the hood trying to stay on. One of the funnier moments was toward the end with the gun shooting. Lap dance chick(Vanessa Ferlito pictured left) was also in Man of the House with Monica Keena (Freddy Vs. Jason) pictured right. Any way to put up another picture of her. Bonus: Bookie watched it. I feel his pain in this one!

Misc. Movie Trivia:
-Film opened on April 6, 2007 as a Grindhouse double feature with Planet Terror and made $25 million at the Box Office ($19.6 million opening weekend)
-Stuntman Mike has two "deathproof" cars, 70' Chevy Nova and 69' Dodge Charger

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