Screening Log
This new site feature is a collective effort to summarize our viewing habits. Occasionally, you will find titles here that are coming to a theater near you, in addition to films viewed on television, and even films viewed in piecemeal. The screening log is archived each month; to view past entries select a month in the menu below.
September 2007 activity
Total Log Entries: 31
- Adam (5)
- Chet (0)
- Chiranjit (0)
- Cullen (0)
- David (0)
- Eva (0)
- Evan (0)
- Ian (1)
- Jenny (5)
- Katherine (0)
- Leo (6)
- Megan (0)
- Rumsey (2)
- Teddy (0)
- Thomas (0)
- Victoria (0)
Total Comments: 3
- Cry Terror! (0)
- The Thing (0)
- 2 Days in Paris (0)
- If… (0)
- The Taking of Pelham One Two Three (0)
- The Kingdom (0)
- Hotel Chevalier (1)
- The Grudge 2 (0)
- Wooden Crosses (0)
- Eastern Promises (1)
- Black Snake Moan (0)
- Death Proof (0)
- Bagdad Cafe (0)
- Dead Reckoning (0)
- Superbad (0)
- Bend It Like Beckham (0)
- Atonement (0)
- In Which We Serve (0)
- No End in Sight (0)
- Red Road (0)
- Aqua Teen Hunger Force Colon Movie For Theatres (0)
- Keeping Mum (0)
- McLibel (0)
- Live Flesh (0)
- Fright Night (0)
- Starman (0)
- Death Sentence (0)
- Halloween (0)
- Casino Royale (0)
- When the Levees Broke: A Requiem in Four Acts (0)
- Rushmore (1)
Full Archive
Death Proof / USA / 2007
Quentin Tarantino’s career trajectory has been smooth and interrupted, a flawless descent from the near-masterpiece of Reservoir Dogs to the near unwatchable Kill Bill Vol. 2, every film has been noticeably worse than the one before it. I was really hoping Death Proof might buck the trend- how could anything be more awful than David Carradine and Uma Thurman discussing Star Trek? But this film actually succeeds, and in spectacular style. It’s not a film, it’s an embarrassment.
I’m no expert on exploitation cinema, but I think even 1970’s drive-in audiences would have balked at film where nothing remotely interesting happens for the first 45 minutes: it’s just talking, and not even very interesting talking, just three thinly sketched and clearly doomed young women nattering. Other characters are mentioned but never appear, there are some decent tunes and some stylish photography, and the director himself in yet another regrettable cameo. And then we get to the interesting stuff- blood! Death! This takes about 5 minutes, and we’re back into another 45 of talking. I mean, I expected this film to be tacky. I expected it to be daft, and violent, and essentially meaningless. I just didn’t expect it to be so unbelievably boring. It’s like My Dinner With Andre in hotpants.
And what of Kurt Russell’s psychotic Stuntman Mike, a character Tarantino’s been arguing is the actor’s best since Snake Plissken? Well, he’s onscreen for about 20 minutes total, and for the last half of that he’s just whimpering a lot. For Quentin to even begin to suggest he’s capable of writing a Snake Plissken or a MacReady is sheer self-delusion: there’s nothing here for Russell to get his teeth into, it’s just a grin, a quiff and a car.
Okay, so the last 15 minutes are pretty neat, the very final scene particularly so. But what leads there is so banal, so messy, so uninspired, so goddamn tedious, it really isn’t worth it. Someone needs to give QT a damn good talking to, there’s got to be something in there worth saving.
by Tom Huddleston | Source: 35mm print
17 Sep 2007 12:56 PM | Submit Comment
