Remember “Grindhouse,” the Robert Rodriguez/Quentin Tarantino double feature that was going to bring about a renaissance in ’70s-style horror films? The films themselves were a flop at the box office, but Rodriguez’s “Planet Terror” and Tarantino’s “Death Proof” did leave an impression with their devotees even if they’re both neither director’s best work (we prefer the fun John Carpenter-esque ‘Terror,’ frankly).
Far more interesting were the faux-trailers played before and in between the two films: Eli Roth’s “Thanksgiving,” Edgar Wright’s “Don’t” and Rob Zombie’s “Werewolf Women of the S.S.” Although the two features were each given a stand-alone DVD release (with extended, uncut versions), a full-experience, single-disc version never materialized. We’ve been excited about the possibility of this edition coming to light for a few weeks since Wright (director of “Shaun of the Dead”) cryptically tweeted that he would be posting a commentary on “Don’t,” leaving us to infer what that obviously meant.
Looks like he let the cat out of the bag. The Blu-ray package is up on Amazon, with a release date of October 5th and a price of $27.99 ($39.95 retail). Interestingly, there’s no DVD version up yet — maybe there will never be one? Seems unlikely, but possible.
No word yet on what might be included as extras, although we’re hoping for the entire two films plus trailer experience on a single disc, with the second reserved for goodies.
Another possibility would be an extended version of Zombie’s ‘Werewolf Women’ trailer—unlike Roth and Wright, he apparently shot enough footage for a 30 minute short that he had to cut down to size. The cast was not too shabby either, including Udo Kier, Sybil Danning and Nicolas Cage (recently profiled in one of this week’s features) as Fu Manchu. Seriously.
We have to admit that we find the fake trailer idea pretty intriguing. In fact, an indie filmmaker from Canada named Jason Eisener made his own fake trailer (“Hobo with a Shotgun”), which was screened in that country as an opener to “Grindhouse.” Talk about a thrill for a new director. Like Robert Rodriguez’s “Machete” trailer, ‘Hobo’ was expanded into a feature-length film starring Rutger Hauer.
As for us, we just hope the release will allow to finally do what we said we wanted to: watch the whole thing in one sitting, very late at night, very drunk.
