palabras Rob Perez

Get ready for three hours of unconventional fun and gore. Grindhouse, Quentin Tarantino’s and Robert Rodriguez’ homage to old grindhouse movies, is a new age thriller that packs lots of blood, boobs, babes, zombies, muscle cars, and guns . . . lots and lots of guns!

Grindhouse features two movies, plus several spoof movie trailers. Grindhouse opens with the faux trailer for Machete, “starring” Danny Trejo as an assassin left for dead by his employer, and Cheech Marin as a former henchman turned man of the cloth. Trejo is asked to assassinate a powerful senator, but it’s he who is assassinated—for apparently no reason whatsoever –except to make a kick-ass violent, action adventure movie! And Trejo and Marin play the stereotypical action heroes, who kill without mercy or breaking a sweat, can outsmart a whole band of bad guys, and can get all the chicks. There’s a brief shot of Trejo skinny-dipping with two big-busted white chicks! Then it’s payback for the bad guys who tried bringing him down. You don’t want to be on the other end of this Mexican’s rage, which is apparently the message in this violent saga!

First up in this double feature is Rodriguez’ Planet Terror, about a virus that turns the residents of a quiet Texas town into zombies, thanks to a botched plan devised by a sleazy bio-chemical scientist, and a band of mercenaries led by Bruce Willis. It’s really a sketch of every good and bad zombie movie ever made—where all the zombies must kill the survivors, move real slowly yet always manage to catch up with the humans. The soon-to-be zombies are noticeable by their dead eyes, and disgusting boils that look as though they’re about to burst with puss! As for the military, you’re never entirely sure if they’re working against spreading the virus, or spreading it themselves—it’s not really explained.

The hero is Freddy Rodriguez, a real Texas cowboy in leather who never misses—an expert marksman who saves the remaining residents, including his former squeeze Cherry Darling (Rose McGowan), a go-go dancer who’s leg is mauled by a zombie. After walking around with a wooden stump, and almost getting raped by a melting military officer—played by Tarantino—her leg is outfitted with a machine gun, who unleashes her own fury at the remaining zombies.

What follows are tons of explosions, more blood, raucous, babes, heads getting blown off, fast bikes and more guns. The acting goes from corny to just bad on purpose, but it’s still a fun-laden hour and a half that goes by quickly. It’s more campy and silly than scary so don’t expect to close your eyes out of fear or you might miss the camera following around hot chicks for no reason whatsoever! Following Planet Terror are trailers for films that ingeniously spoof virtually every horror film cliché.

Quentin Tarantino’s Death Proof is all about hot cars and hot chicks! Kurt Russell is Stuntman Mike—a homicidal stuntman who uses his wheels to kill. The babes he’s after are gear heads/stuntwomen Kim (Tracie Thoms), Zoe Bell playing herself, and Abernathy (Rosario Dawson). But before he chases them down, he’s already killed several hotties, who by the time they’re killed you’re glad Stuntman Mike has reamed them with two thousand pounds of metal. The only time most people will be rooting for Stuntman Mike is during the ultimate showdown, which caps off this car chase thriller. Abernathy, Kim and Zoe are out on the highway playing a dangerous car stunt, until Stuntman Mike finds these babes and begins a dual to the death chase. Unaware of the expertise of the driver, Stuntman Mike soon finds out he’s messed with the wrong broads, who then do the chasing. It leaves the audience taking sides—those rooting for the babes, and those rooting for Stuntman Mike, but the comical ending is the perfect way to end this three-hour thrill ride.

Grindhouse is non-stop action, packed with the guiltiest of all guilty movie pleasures that will make you wish it was 1971. This glorified B-movie is really worth your $11 bucks!