Two for the price of one

Back in the 1970s, 42nd Street in Manhattan, N.Y., was the place to be if you wanted to see exploitation cinema at its finest. Whether it be the latest Swedish sex-bomb porno, blaxploitation or women-in-prison flick, the theaters populating the infamous street had it all. And thanks to Robert Rodriguez and Quentin Tarantino's "Grindhouse," an homage to the sleazefests of old, you can finally experience exploitation cinema in a theater where the seats aren't terrible and the floor is only sticky from popcorn butter. But I'm not here to sing the praises of QT's segment -- I'll let fellow critic John Barnett elaborate on the wonders of "Death Proof."\nRodriguez's "Planet Terror" is one great throwback to the zombiefests that came from the European wave of horror exploitation, where blood and guts in almost every scene is the norm. Cherry Darling (Rose McGowan) is a go-go girl who just quit her job in hopes of something better and El Wray (Freddy Rodríguez) is her ex-lover who just wants his jacket back. Turns out some crazy stuff has been going down at a local military base where a toxin has "accidentally" been released into the air, turning almost the entire town into flesh-devouring monstrosities. Except, of course, for Cherry, Wray and a handful of other folks including a scorned doctor (Marley Shelton), the local sheriff (Michael Biehn), a BBQ chef (Jeff Fahey) and a biochemical engineer (Naveen Andrews) who just might be responsible for this whole mess.\nPrepare yourself for one of the most gruesome experiences you've ever had in a theater. You think crap like the "Saw" movies are tough to stomach? Well, "Planet Terror" will hit you like a semi-truck barreling through a zombie horde. Entire bodies explode and coat the screen in blood, pus and whatever bodily fluids you can imagine. Rodriguez is simply returning to his "From Dusk Till Dawn" days and amping up the gore. And after McGowan gets her leg eaten by zombies only to be replaced with a machine-gun/grenade-launcher combo, you'll find appreciation for director Jean-Luc Godard's famous phrase: "All you need to make a movie is a girl and a gun." \nYes, the dialogue can be ridiculously bad at times and the "missing reel" is likely to piss most viewers off (expect it to turn up on the "Grindhouse" DVD), but the experience alone is worth the $8 admission price because you've never seen anything like this. Besides, how many films get away with an 8-year-old kid blowing his face off? The MPAA failed, Robert Rodriguez won.\nFour fake trailers make up "Grindhouse" and I've got two of them for you. First is "Machete," Rodriguez's revenge flick starring Danny Trejo as one big badass who walks around with a trench coat full of machetes and rides a motorcycle equipped with a gatling gun. Word is Rodriguez shot so much footage for this trailer he might just turn it into a full-length feature -- after you see the trailer, you'll be counting the days. Then there is Rob Zombie's "Werewolf Women of the SS," which somehow combines the monster movie with the Nazi exploitation genre. The result is a work so absurd it demands to be made into its own movie, but until then you might just rent "Ilsa, She-Wolf of the SS" to see what Zombie is referencing, sans werewolves.\nJust think, after witnessing all this carnage, you get to sit back for another 90 minutes and watch Kurt Russell kill women with a stuntcar. Enjoy!