Tarantino’s Last Good Idea: Riding Rodriguez’ Coat Tails

On April 5th, just twenty-two days ago, Quentin Tarantino revealed “Grindhouse” to the world, and proved the last of his remaining talent has dried up. Fortunately, Tarantino’s friendship with Robert Rodriguez led to a collaboration on this film extravaganza and saved what surely would have been Tarantino’s quick sinking career.
Tarantino’s interesting and compelling ideas propelled his success, particularly where his directorial skills fell short. The most common questions to be found at this juncture is, “Did Tarantino not understand the assignment? Did he forget what he was aiming to produce here? Did he fall down and smack his little head?”

At this point, this theory makes the most sense. Maybe, just maybe, he just forgot to read the directions at the top of the page, or perhaps check the fine print.

As they publicly stated, Rodriguez and Tarantino set out to create a seventies throwback reminiscent of a “grind house” theatre. However, Tarantino’s use of special effects and perfect film quality completely undermined what he said he was setting out to do. The film had sporadic moments that gave that feeling, but they quickly disappeared into the annoyingly long “dumb-girl” dialogue. Tarantino usually picks women that are clever, fascinating, and incredibly sexy. The ladies in “Death Proof” possessed little of these elements, and with beauties like Rosario Dawson, that is hard to do. Thus, we can only blame Tarantino’s crappy directing. By the time the credits rolled, I was half wishing the villain, Kurt Russell, would jump out of the screen and bless me with the quick, though painful, death he bestowed on his many victims.

Hopefully, Tarantino will be able to redeem himself in his next film and recapture his once loyal audience because the Rodriguez camp is looking a whole lot more appealing.