Planet Terror (2007)

Fantastic!

Excellent, Without a doubt!!

Excellent characters with emotional depth. My wife, daughter and granddaughter all enjoyed it...and me, too! Very good movie! You won't be disappointed.

The tone of this movie is interesting -- the stakes are both dramatic and high, but it's balanced with a lot of fun, tongue and cheek dialogue.

I think this might arguably be Robert Rodriguez's best, and he has some pretty ones ("Sin City" is probably a close second). Rodriguez is not an art-house director by any means, but he is a director of wildly entertaining films and I think this may be his most entertaining, though I'll also say this film probably has the narrowest audience appeal. The story is a zombie one about a government experiment gone wrong that infects the populace of a small Texas town, but this film is unique in that it was one half of Rodriguez and Quentin Tarantino's "Grindhouse" double feature, that tried to recreate the experience of going to rundown theaters and watching low budget explorations films of the 1970s, complete with fake exploitation film trailers, damaged film prints, and missing reels to round out the experience. That's what I think limits the film's appeal to a wide audience, because not only does Rodriguez embrace the visual aesthetics of these films, he also fully embraces the ratcheted up sex and violence of these same exploitation films that he's celebrating, which is not going to appeal to all audience members. I can't speak from personal experience in regards to attending grindhouse theaters, but I can attest to watching many of these films during the VHS heyday. Those VHS video gems did include cheesy trailers for cheap low budget films and often did include poor film transfers that included damaged film prints, so even for a gen-xer like me, this film provided a lot of nostalgia. Freddy Rodríguez is the hero of the film who helps save his stripper girlfriend, Rose McGowan, from zombies. In the process McGowan loses her leg, which is eventually replaced with an M-16. Josh Brolin plays a terrifically villainous doctor after his ex-wife Marley Shelton. I think this was the first film I saw him in where I realized this guy can really act and isn't just the guy from "Goonies" and "Thrashin'". You also have Jeff Fahey, Michael Biehn, Fergie, Nicky Katt and Bruce Willis. A great touch is that Willis is never shown in the same shot as the rest of the cast, which was a favorite trick of exploitation films who would hire one major (usually fading) start to film one or two days worth of footage that could be inserted into the rest of the film, then giving producers the opportunity to boast about the films' fabulous cast. Rodriguez pretty much summed up this love letter to exploitation films of yore when he said, "The posters were much better than the movies, but we're actually making something that lives up to the posters." and he absolutely did!

Robert Rodriguez's Planet Terror is by far the better of the two films (Death Proof being the other) that come together to create Grindhouse. This is one of the more darkly comedic and stylized, zombie survival movies out there, clearly a homage to all those old B-movies from back in the day. From the 'missing reel' gags to the choppy editing, the movie is flat out brilliant. Rodriguez did his homework on the genre and created a fantastic genre piece that is destined to find a solid cult following.Each character here gets their own story, some being more serious and others being quite humorous, but they all come together to create a bizarre story. Everyone in the movie seems to have a hidden agenda or some sort of cryptic undertone that carries over throughout the entire movie. That's what makes each story entertaining, you never know what the characters are capable of, especially during a zombie outbreak. But what really made the movie special was the aesthetics used in the movie to give it some visual flair, these days zombie movies are so common that they lack any originality, at least here they took a gamble and in my eyes, it paid off. You couldn't ask for a movie where the people behind the camera are having just as much fun as those in front of the camera. This is a movie you have to experience.In the end, this movie demands an acquired taste (horror aficionados and zombie lovers), others might not appreciate what the filmmakers were trying to accomplish. Planet Terror, along with Death Proof was a huge gamble on behalf of everyone involved behind the camera, and I'd have to say it was halfway successful.....this movie being the successful half.

Grindhouse: Planet Terror (2007): Dir: Robert Rodriguez / Cast: Rose McGowan, Freddy Rodriguez, Josh Brolin, Marley Shelton, Jeff Fahey: First of stylized double drive-in style feature regards a deadly gas that turns humanity into zombies. Robert Rodriguez is creative but the plot eventually becomes one graphic scene of violence after another. Rose McGowan delivers a great performance as a go-go dancer whose leg is devoured by zombies and replaced with a machine gun. The methods in which this weapon is used are a low point in over the top violence. Freddy Rodriguez plays her fugitive ex-boyfriend who takes several risks and uses his street smarts to ward off zombies. Josh Brolin plays a cynical doctor who abuses his bi-sexual wife when he learns that she has been involved with another woman. Marley Shelton plays his wife whose hands become lifeless at a pivotal moment. She must survive using other methods that do not regard the use of her hands. Jeff Fahey plays head chef at a fancy little place called The Bone Shack, which is the perfect title for an eatery in a film like this. Between the two Grindhouse films I prefer the Quentin Tarantino version Deathproof, which is broader and more amusing. Both film suit the drive-in market but from two very different sub-genres. With all the graphic violence this film nearly becomes a different type of terror. Score: 5 / 10

This is one of my favorite movies, and in my opinion, one of Tarantino's best films. Its hilarious, has plenty of action,gore,violence.....and zombies. It also has plenty of big names in it, including Tarantino, and you can tell that they all had fun making it. In terms of comparison, i'd put it back to back with from dusk till dawn, replacing that films vampires with the afore mentioned zombies. Its just as over the top, if not a little more so. The only real complaint I have, is the little scratching noises, the parts that are supposed to look like they were over exposed, and every once in awhile, the card that would come up with "scene missing" on it. Yes, as I said I know this was all done deliberately, to make it look like a drive in movie, but it still became annoying after awhile. This movie is worth seeing just to see the fate of Tarantino's character, and the infamous "melting dick" scene.