“I’m not a cowboy Pam. I’m a stuntman!”
Well it’s the Friday before Christmas and “the woods are lovely, dark and deep. And I have promises to keep. Miles to go before I sleep” and I thought of you dear reader, just finishing the wrapping of presents to place beneath the Christmas tree your cat has been fixated on for the past three weeks (and that damn shiny bauble just out of its reach) and I thought what you’d need right now, to distract you from the cat and your purposeful teasing of it (you rascal!), would be to list all the deliberate burns and scratches, reverse dialogue and out of sync audio contained within Quentin Tarantino’s homage to the Grindhouse Cinemas of the 1970’s, Death Proof.
Take a shot of tequila if you dare, wear a red bandana and listen to “Down in Mexico” by The Coasters. Enjoy yourself! We’re all adults here.
Death Proof is my 9th and least favourite in the cannon of cinematic work from Hollywood’s enfant terrible, Quentin Tarantino. Not exactly an endorsement but then again, there are eight rather stupendous films ahead of it on the QT pecking order, and all nine are lovingly appreciated in the two blog articles at the end of this brief introduction.
The movie poster that headlines this article was in pride of place and the central image of a kitchen of mine for years. It would be the first image to greet any visitors and naturally I hoped they’d remark on the deliberately retro looking poster just so I could wax lyrical on the genius that is Quentin Tarantino!
I endeavour to pen my film articles in a slightly different way every time, focussing on a particular role or scene or perhaps the opening ten minutes pre and post credits. Here I’ve listed all the deliberate homages to Grindhouse Cinema but wrapped around all of these reverse audio loops, cigarette burns and jagged edit cuts is a majestic soundtrack, a lap dance from heaven and a glorious and bloody revenge story!
The Genius of Quentin Tarantino
The nine films of Quentin Tarantino. Or is it a Hateful Eight?medium.com
The Genius of Quentin Tarantino Vol 2
Once Upon a Time in Hollywood. Oozing with myopic love, not spoilers.medium.com
“I’m not a cowboy Pam…….I’m a Stuntman!”
Initially concepted as part of a Grindhouse double bill with good friend and “brother” Robert Rodriguez’s Planet Terror (which is also highly recommended, naturally), early negative critical reaction saw both films released separately. Both fans of 1970’s Grindhouse cinema whereby the theatres themselves were less than salubrious and the quality of the film print poor and decayed, this is also Tarantino’s singular homage to stuntman orientated films of the period, of muscle cars too but primarily another exploitation film. In relation to Grindhouse itself, it became infamous for the poor quality, crackling sound, badly edited and distorted picture the theatres would provide and in my own amateur homage to this I’ve reviewed this fantastic film by concentrating on this as you’ll see. I’ve also picked and briefly described my three favourite scenes from each Act.
A brief premise: “Stuntman Mike” (Kurt Russell) is a psychotic killer who derives sexual pleasure from car crashes, especially if they involve beautiful women.
The film itself is split into two distinct Acts, with a short bridging scene in between the two. My own amateur homage to Grindhouse will be to point these out in each Act, however I’ve only concentrated on the real crunching and awkward examples of this, as the film, and especially Act One is bathed in them! Please don’t let the Grindhouse aspect of this film put you off watching as it’s a fantastic film (naturally), rich characters, Tarantino dialled up to 10, and the Grindhouse aspect just adds to the flavour of the whole piece.
Did I mention the soundtrack?
Sublime.
ACT ONE: Grindhouse homages:
During the opening title sequence Thunderbolt is deliberately and incorrectly shown as the film’s title.
Crunching abrupt cut from “Arlene” (or “Butterfly”) as she’s running holding her crotch to the apartment of “Julia Lucai” (or “Jungle Julia”), to all three girls now driving in their car.
Screen flicker as Jungle Julia says “Who’s Holding?”.
Abrupt cut from a conversation about Jesse Letterman to a totally separate “no hooking up tonight” conversation.
Car containing the three girls simply disappears in the middle of the road, and in mid cheer as the girls go past another billboard for the Jungle Julia radio show.
Crunching “cigarette burn” before introduction to Jungle Julia’s friend “Marcy”.
Dialogue constantly out of sync for 3/4 seconds during same introduction to Marcy.
As Marcy addresses Butterfly, the reels sound as though they are turning in reverse so we hear “so you must be”, then “you must be the infamous Butterfly”.
A completely blank slide is inserted during the above conversation.
Sadly(!) the lap dance from Butterfly comes to a crunching abrupt halt mid-way through the fantastic “Down in Mexico” by The Coasters.
ACT ONE: Three Favourite Scenes
ACT TWO: Grindhouse homages:
As Stuntman Mike pulls into a parking spot, the colour is abruptly changed to black and white.
As “Abernathy” (Rosario Dawson) is sitting on the bonnet of her car smoking, the black and white abruptly changes back to colour.
Crunching pink distortion as “Zoe” (Zoe Bell) climbs out of the car to execute her “ships mast” stunt.
“The End” credits end abruptly, replaced by a “Written and Directed by Quentin Tarantino” and then quickly and awkwardly back again.
ACT TWO: 3 Favourite scenes
Thanks for reading. Just for larks as always, and always a human reaction rather than spoilers galore. My three most recently published film articles are linked below or there’s well over 100 blog articles (with 300+ individual film reviews) within my archives from which to choose:
“Top Gun” (1986)
The Best of Tony Scott — Vol 5.medium.com
“Edward Scissorhands” (1990)
The Best of Tim Burton — Vol 1.medium.com
“Down Terrace” (2009)
Ben Wheatley’s disturbing and blackly comedic cinematic debut.medium.com