Salutations, traveler of The Internets! Welcome to William's Bloody Hell, so named after our founder, Sir Bloody William.
He is seen in the likeness above in a rare, 19th century woodcut. This
image was rumoured to have been
commissioned after a bout of unpleasantness
in the White Chapel district of London. Do enjoy your stay and peruse our many, varied offerings, much of which cannot be found elsewhere!
:: Grindhouse ::
by William the Bloody
Grindhouse, in case you don't know is the ambitious double feature film by directors Robert Rodrigez and Quentin Tarentino. Let's break it on down:
Feature 1: Planet Terror is Rodrigez's tale of a government chemical warfare agent released into the atmosphere and causing severe pustule encrusted mutations and a hunger for human flesh. We follow go-go dancer Cherry who gets one of her legs eaten off by a pack if infected mutates and rescued by her exboyfriend Ray. Ray is quite a lot smarter and handier in a crisis than the local law enforcement want to initially admit, but pretty soon anyone who can resist getting infected is banding together in order to survive.
Feature 2: Death Proof is about a former stunt car driver who now gets his kicks by inducing terror and murdering groups of attractive young ladies in his old stunt car, which has been modified to keep the driver safe during terrible crashes (thusly "death proofed"). Other occupants and people in other cars ain't so lucky. But, hey, will Stuntman Mike's luck also run out?
The Good: Where to begin? In case you haven't seen or heard anything about the premise of this double feature, let me tell you that their intention was to create a theater experience like they had when they were teenagers in the grimy main street movie houses of the 1970s. You get the whole deal here: trailers for fake movies, the little "feature presentation" lead-ins, the "this movie is rated Restricted" warnings, celluloid wear and tear, missing reels, and Technicolor mismatches. But that's not all. Oh hells no. You also get two 90 minute blissful romps in pure cinematic cheese. Planet Terror has not only the look, but also actually has the feel of a crappy 1970s fright fest. Believe me. I know this stuff. It felt like I was watching something like The Incredible Melting Man or something. It has it all: crappy horror movie plastic effects, the gross out scenes, a child in peril, scantily clad hot women, a do or die hero, and Freddy Rodrigez on a mini-bike. Death Proof, or Car Chase: The Movie as I like to call it, was what it was. An excuse for a little violence before slapping on a thrilling ride of a car chase, or two. It's basically like one of those old movies that give a loose plot in order to have an excuse to give you some hot women being all bad ass and show off their goods. You know the Angel's Revenge type. But what I like about this double feature dealie is this: it delivers exactly what it promises and is exactly what it says it is. This film didn't make any outrageous claims about being the best movie ever made, or being award worthy, artistic, or anything. It promised to give you action, thrills and chills and it did. It promised a cheesy zombie movie and a car movie and dammit that's exactly what you got.
The Bad: I've noticed that most of trailers hype Planet Terror and not very much is known out there about Death Proof, so some people may go in without knowing what to expect. You'll just have to trust that you won't be disappointed. Also, I'm not too sure how this will translate to the small screen for the DVD release.
Overall, I've often heard of films being referred to as a "rollercoaster ride" but had yet to know what exactly that meant... until now. Grindhouse is a one of a kind movie theater experience which goddamn it, NEEDS to be seen on the big screen for the full effect. I'm not kidding. See this thing in your local duplex immediately. You'll be shocked, you'll scream "eeeewwww!!!", you'll gasp, you'll laugh out loud, and so will everyone else in the room and it will be awesome.
A-
