This has been one of the most anticipated weekends that I have had in a long time, due to the fact Grind House would be in theatres nationwide. I knew that it would take me for the ride of my life, while sitting in one place for three plus hours. It seems in the movie business, these two guys can do no wrong. I wish there was a such thing as putting new movies out every month, but one director can only do so much. With that being said, what happened to Grind House at the box office this weekend?
To begin, the movie is a huge experiment and on the same token, it is paying homage to the exploitation era. We new generation kids are not familiar with anything called a double bill. There are the die hard cult fans like myself that will stay at movie theatres all day. There are also the people that like to get in and out of a movie as soon as possible. This is where the downfall at the box office took place.
Grind House was a bet that most people saw as a pot of gold. The Weinsteins (Miramax/Weinstein Company) were probably riding high on the past success of these two gifted film directors. Rodriguez and Tarantino have die hard fans that will practically do anything to be a part of anything they may be doing. The fans are practically one in the same. I know that I am one person, but these two happen to be my favorite directors of all time. With that being said, “I can give these two guys nothing but praise for their efforts.
We are now thirty years past the exploitation era and many things have changed. Most people do not mind sitting in a movie for 90 minutes, but anything longer and patience begins to wear thin. We are offered too many movies these days that are told in a two hour plus span. Most of the said movies, would be better off if the time was trimmed down by a half hour. Some things need to be told, but the rest simply do not. What we have going on at current date is a different type of audience. Most people would rather be doing a million other things that are offered in society today. Apparently, one of the main forms of entertainment thirty years ago was movies. With that being said, not many people like to sit in the same place for three or more hours.
Grind House was three full hours of sheer entertainment for me. It was so much fun, I nearly made the movie three time this weekend. We are being given two movies in one sitting, so the three hours are justified in my eyes. I was hooked from the first scene and it only got better from there. There were fake trailers introduced (Machete, Don’t Scream, Thanksgiving and Werewolf Women of the SS) that should probably be full length motion pictures. We start out with Rodriguez’s flick called Planet Terror. This is perhaps the best zombie movie that I have ever witnessed. I know most people will beg to differ on the account of George Romero’s(Dawn of the Dead) status. This one does not have anything to do with originality, but there are elements in Planet Terror that has not been tapped before. Rose McGowan’s character suffers a tragedy in the beginning of the movie which leaves her with one leg and a half. This is exploited in one of the best ways I could possibly imagine. McGowan walks around with a wooden leg broken off of a table for most of the movie. When the action really gets down to business, she substitutes the wooden leg for a rifle with a grenade launcher attached to it(in the military we call that a M-203).
Death Proof which is non other than Tarantino’s portion of the movie meets my expectation, as well. I would have done things slightly different, but he did it for the audience which is acceptable. This segment is very dialogue heavy which will make most people impatient and wonder when he’s going to get to the point. He has a story to tell and he only had so much time to do it. The average person will go into Death Proof expecting to see a man in a car running amok similar to the cult classic Christine. Once again, this has nothing to do with originality, but he is simply telling the story in a way that he would have liked to see it. True Tarantino fans will love it simply because of the witty dialogue. There will be others that will swear the movie off and say such things as too much girl talk.
This double bill works as an overall movie experience, but fails in it’s attempts to convince the masses that the three hour sit is well worth it. There could be several reasons why the turnout was bad. It is far superior to any movie that came out in front, numbers wise this weekend. Blades of Glory, Meet the Robinsons and Are we Done yet, are the subpar movies that defeated Grind House at the box office. This is a very disappointing travesty, and hopefully word of mouth will help these two great films in the long run. I am not sure that I could come up with with a marketing strategy that would turn things around, but if people are willing to watch Titantic, they can definitely tolerate Grind House. I went 2 times this weekend and neither time felt like three hours. We will see what happens in the coming weeks.
