I Watch 'Em So You Don't Have To

The Drive In Experience


Grindhouse: Death Proof (2007)


Again, we get the great drive-in type experience and a kind of unique story. I say that because, unless there are others that I'm not aware of (totally possible) this is only one of three movies where you are introduced to protagonists, get to know them, see them for half the movie, then they're killed (the other two are Psycho and Horror Hotel, coincidentally produced the same year in different countries in 1960). That's what happens here, just as a warning. But it is central to the plot so I guess Quentin Tarantino (who wrote and directed this one) felt it was a good move.

Who lives? Who dies? Watch and find out....

The plot: Three friends go out for drinks and whatever. They don't know it but a nasty piece of work, former stuntman Mike (Kurt Russell) has been stalking them wherever they go. Mike has a hell of a car, made for stuntwork. As he explains to one victim the car completely protects him - but not the passenger (after which he slams on the brakes and... well, splat). So he wants these girls. Why? Maybe because they're young, they don't notice him, they're drinking and smoking a lot of weed, and he's just a mean son of a bitch. So they leave and he starts following them. He arranges to get ahead of them, turn around and in the dark speeds toward them for a nasty head-on collision.... and there goes our protagonists of the first half of the movie.


Only slightly wounded Mike is exonerated (after all, the women were all drunk and stoned). However this is Texas and a Ranger is suspicious so Mike has to find himself another state where he gets himself another car to 'reset' his little trap. And we get new protagonists.


Skip ahead a little over a year. We get Abernathy (Rosario Dawson, Kim (Tracie Thoms) and Lee (Mary Elizabeth Winstead) who are driving through Tennessee. They get Mike's attention but he holds off. They pick up their friend Zoe Bell (playing herself), a stuntwoman from New Zealand, from the airport. Zoe wants to go to a remote place where a 1970 Dodge Challenger which is exactly like the car used in the movie Vanishing Point (I haven't seen that but the hubby has and says it's absolutely awesome) is for sale.


In order to test-drive the car (read see how fast they can go in it) they leave behind Lee as collateral I guess. Nice friends. They then squeal out with the car and start really revving it up, and... stuff. Sorry, I don't know a lot about regular cars or muscle cars so I can't give you more information than that, you'll just have to watch it.

A muscle car to die for....

Zoe, being the fearless stuntwoman wants to play what is called 'Ship's Mast' where she rides on the hood using only leather belts to hold onto while Kim revs the car up to top speeds. Unfortunately that's when Mike makes his move. He rear-ends the car with Zoe clinging for dear life. They get in a life or death battle and.... well let's just say the ending was very satisfying and I loved watching Kurt Russell cry like a bitch. Sorry about that, that was kind of mean... but this is definitely an affirmative action type movie, and women are NOT portrayed as victims, at least in the second half of the movie. This one I think women as well as men would enjoy  - give it a try.