Grindhouse Trailer Classics 2

Introduction

The 2007 film Grindhouse by Quentin Tarantino and Robert Rodriguez re-introduced the term 'grindhouse' into common parlance and sparked an interest in the weird, sleazy and inventive films that inspired their flop.

One of the features of Grindhouse was the inclusion of fake trailers for other grindhouse films, such as Machete and Werewolf Women of the SS. This DVD follows on from Volume 1 with more weird and wonderful trailers, selected by Marc Morris, co-author of Shock! Horror! Outstanding Artwork from the Video Nasty Era.

This 112 minute DVD contains 55 trailers, all explointation movies, whether it be sexploitation, blaxploitation or violence and gore. These include Foxy Brown, Jail Bait Babysitter, Cut-Throats Nine, Chain Gang Women, Sister Street Fighter and Black Shampoo.

Video

As you'd expect, the picture quality is reassuringly bad, with plenty of dirt, scratches and other detritus - this only serves to add to the fun.

Audio

As with the visual quality, this isn't intended to be the best quality soundtrack and is dominated by deep voiced announcers promising never before seen levels of violence, gore, action, nudity and sex.

Extra Features

Into the Grindhouse is a ten minute interview with Stephen Thrower, the author of 'Nightmare USA' where he talks about how he became interested in grindhouse films and his appreciation of the independent exploitation films of the 1970-85 period.

There is a gallery containing posters from the featured trailers. There are also trailers for other exploitation releases available from Nucleus Films.

Conclusion

My interests in, and appreciation of, films is wide and varied. Whilst I will happily watch Citizen Kane, I will also spend 90 minutes watching a deliberately cheap and sleazy exploitation movie and was surprised how many of these I had seen, own and would like to have on DVD. There are some terrible films released at the cinema today but these were from an era when the theatre was cheap and movies were ground out at an extraordinary rate - hence 'grindhouse' - with little respect for quality.

There is plenty of nudity, violence, blood and OTT action - all accompanied by the announcer telling you how the full film is worse (better) than anything you have seen before and is not suitable for those easily shocked. This collection of trailers is great fun to watch, whether you're by yourself or, most likely, with a few friends and some drinks.

This is a brilliant tribute to the sleaze, trash and purveyors of gore and naked flesh of the 1970s and '80s, I thoroughly enjoyed it and recommend it to anyone with an open mind and sense of humour - particularly those with an interest in the sorts of films trailed here.