Tag: Eli Roth

 One of Tarantino’s signature nuances is his treatment of actors. Tarantino intentionally leaves ambiguity and the opportunity for improvisation, likely inspired by the French New Wave film movement. In two similarly structured interrogation scenes, the mise-en-scene acts as springboard for the manifestation of character attributes, which each actor can approach differently. The appropriate selection of props is crucial to induce the most meaningful response from Tarantino’s actors and drive the narrative.

July 9, 2010 / / Main Slate Archive
October 1, 2007 / / Film Notes

The basic premise behind Grindhouse, the B-movie double feature from directors Quentin Tarantino and Robert Rodriguez, isn’t really all that novel. Director Stanley Donen’s 1978 effort Movie Movie is a strikingly similar package to Grindhouse, albeit Donen flew solo. That package is this: a pair of separate movies sharing some of the same cast members and glued together by nostalgia and fake trailers (Grindhouse‘s fake trailers are a major drawing card, featuring cameo directorial appearances by Rob Zombie, Edgar Wright, and Eli Roth). But while Movie Movie affectionately spoofed the candy-sweetness of Old Hollywood in the midst of the grittier 1970s, Grindhouse longingly harks back to exploitative ’70s cheapies in an era when Hollywood product has grown dishearteningly slick and safe. By marking up their movies with scratches, pops, and intentionally missing reels, Tarantino and Rodriguez’s modus operandi is to transform sanitary suburban multiplexes into grindhouse cinemas that, while undeniably rattier, at least had a kind of dingy individualism intact. The entire enterprise is more about the act of going to see a film than anything else. See it on DVD and you’ve already skipped half the joke.