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Frosstbyte · 04-06-2007, 06:54 PM

Another movie I really wanted to love but didn't. I enjoyed a lot of it, but not the whole thing.

I agree that the fake preview are nothing short of spectacular. They were all over the top and all thoroughly entertaining in exactly the right way.

"Planet Terror" I thoroughly enjoyed. Halx's review says everything I would say about the movie, so I won't bother repeating it. I liked this movie better than the other by a significant margin. Random trivia if you didn't catch it, Spoiler: the last item on the female doctor's "To Do" list is "Kill Bill". This movie achieved everything it set out to be and did so with style and a very large tongue stuck in its cheek.

"Death Proof" was, in my opinion, horrible. The dialogue had a few funny moments but, for the most part, was trite, boring and lacked direction. There is an hour of dialogue, then 5 minutes of action that has almost NOTHING to do with that action. Then the movie resets and you get another thirty minutes of totally superfluous dialogue before 15 minutes of chase scene death race action. Now, I realize that Tarantino writes rambling movies and that some of his most famous dialogue has had shit to do with moving the plot-the "Quarter Pounder" exchange being one of the most notable.

I concede that I'm much more familiar with the zombie movies that "Planet" drew inspiration from than from whatever movies Tarantino tried to work with in "Death Proof", but the concept fell totally flat for me. I didn't particularly identify or care about any of the characters and there was no consistency between the first and second halves of the movie. I did not need the introduction of five characters over an hour of movie to learn that Spoiler: Kurt Russell's character is a psycho who can't blow his load without killing cute girls in a car crash only to have all five of them die instantly and horrifically. The movie then suddenly moves to a whole new place with four whole new people that I care and know nothing about just so they can encounter the same creepy dude but emerge victorious instead of ending up roadkill.

I think a lot of what Hal said about Tarantino being too smart for this genre is true, only it worked for him and didn't work for me. The movie wasn't really much of a knock off of an exploitation movie, nor was it fully conceived enough to be a solid actual Tarantino movie. I thought the punch line flopped, if it ever came. So it goes.

The one thing about both movies that my brain was never really able to wrap around was the fact that they tried SO hard to make them grounded in the 1970s, but then everyone had cell phones and sidekicks. Why?!? Those yanked me out of the moment and the ambiance and I still now can't imagine why both directors decided to go with leaving them in.

04-06-2007, 06:54 PM	#10 (permalink)
Frosstbyte Winter is Coming Location: The North	Another movie I really wanted to love but didn't. I enjoyed a lot of it, but not the whole thing. I agree that the fake preview are nothing short of spectacular. They were all over the top and all thoroughly entertaining in exactly the right way. "Planet Terror" I thoroughly enjoyed. Halx's review says everything I would say about the movie, so I won't bother repeating it. I liked this movie better than the other by a significant margin. Random trivia if you didn't catch it, Spoiler: the last item on the female doctor's "To Do" list is "Kill Bill". This movie achieved everything it set out to be and did so with style and a very large tongue stuck in its cheek. "Death Proof" was, in my opinion, horrible. The dialogue had a few funny moments but, for the most part, was trite, boring and lacked direction. There is an hour of dialogue, then 5 minutes of action that has almost NOTHING to do with that action. Then the movie resets and you get another thirty minutes of totally superfluous dialogue before 15 minutes of chase scene death race action. Now, I realize that Tarantino writes rambling movies and that some of his most famous dialogue has had shit to do with moving the plot-the "Quarter Pounder" exchange being one of the most notable. I concede that I'm much more familiar with the zombie movies that "Planet" drew inspiration from than from whatever movies Tarantino tried to work with in "Death Proof", but the concept fell totally flat for me. I didn't particularly identify or care about any of the characters and there was no consistency between the first and second halves of the movie. I did not need the introduction of five characters over an hour of movie to learn that Spoiler: Kurt Russell's character is a psycho who can't blow his load without killing cute girls in a car crash only to have all five of them die instantly and horrifically. The movie then suddenly moves to a whole new place with four whole new people that I care and know nothing about just so they can encounter the same creepy dude but emerge victorious instead of ending up roadkill. I think a lot of what Hal said about Tarantino being too smart for this genre is true, only it worked for him and didn't work for me. The movie wasn't really much of a knock off of an exploitation movie, nor was it fully conceived enough to be a solid actual Tarantino movie. I thought the punch line flopped, if it ever came. So it goes. The one thing about both movies that my brain was never really able to wrap around was the fact that they tried SO hard to make them grounded in the 1970s, but then everyone had cell phones and sidekicks. Why?!? Those yanked me out of the moment and the ambiance and I still now can't imagine why both directors decided to go with leaving them in.