well i personally loved Death Proof.
do i think it’s Tarantino’s best film? No. is it still damn good though? yes.
things i INITIALLY disliked:
one of the main things i was initially disappointed with was that it wasn’t the full on slasher/horror movie i thought it would be.
i know QT was reinventing the slasher genre a la the crime/heist genre with Reservoir Dogs but in a way i felt he went TOO far this time.
for all it’s relentless reinvention and innovation, Reservoir Dogs still felt like you were watching a gritty heist movie.
apart from a few token creepy shots of Arlene noticing Mike’s car and the whole sequence from Rose McGowan getting into the car to the end of the crash (which i think is the darkest, creepiest thing QT ever wrote and directed incidentally) , Death Proof doesn’t play like a horror movie at all( i mean GOOD horror btw not generic cheesey crap) and of course, the second half is practically a whole other movie.
HOWEVER, I’ve noticed that the first half is EXTREMELY CREEPY ON SUBSEQUENT VIEWINGS. The part where Mike recites the poem gets me every time and that John Wayne impersonation…Yikes!
the other thing that also disappointed me at first was the seemingly endless dialogue…IN THE SECOND HALF ONLY.
i actually think the first half is flawless in that regard. but the second half was the only time where i thought ‘ok this is definately dragging’.
the car scene? great- establishes character and group dynamics (and vaguely mirrors the car dialogue in the first half)
the diner scene? - very long but vital in setting things up, more character development and group interaction, Mike in the background is awesome and a technical marvel.
THEN we get to Jasper’s place…and the movie ALMOST DIES IMO.
i know Tarantino wants us to ‘fall in love with a whole new bunch of girls all over again’ so we care about their fate, but at this point in the movie we already know Mike’s M.O and have a good idea what these girls are like but there is endless scene after scene of dialogue about the most minute thing. long talking scenes with Zoe and Kim, THEN Zoe, Kim and Abernathy, THEN Abernathy and Jasper THEN Zoe and Kim outside the car prior to the stunt. most of which could have been summed up much quicker without detriment to the film.
It doesn’t help that QT chooses to the shoot most of these scenes in static two shots- i’m not expecting zany camera work or MTV editing but it really made me conscious that the movie had slowed down to a crawl and i’m not sure if that was QT’s intention.
But of course once the chase was on it was plain sailing from there.
i’ll describe what i specifically loved about Death Proof in a later post but for now , i’m just expressing my opinion of i think is a flaw in an otherwise brilliant and subversive movie.
