In Quentin Tarantino’s filmmography, arguably the film most frequently listed as his weakest effort to date was the “Death Proof” part of his and Robert Rodriguez’s “Grindhouse” project in 2007.
“Grindhouse” was a homage to 1970s exploitation films shown in now-defunct ‘grindhouse’ theaters with the project consisting of two features – Rodriguez’s “Planet Terror” and Tarantino’s “Death Proof” – combined with some specially trailers in between from directors like Eli Roth, Rob Zombie and Edgar Wright.
Coming in at a costly budget of $53–67 million, the film was a bomb on impact – taking a global total of just $25.4 million despite very good reviews. Over a decade later, Tarantino has spoken with Empire Online and says he and Rodriguez misjudged the public’s interest in recreating an experience very few of them would have had:
“With Grindhouse, I think me and Robert just felt that people had a little more of a concept of the history of double features and exploitation movies…No, they didn’t. At all. They had no idea what the f–k they were watching. It meant nothing to them, alright, what we were doing. So that was a case of being a little too cool for school.”
He also goes on to talk about a humbling experience he had watching the movie in the UK, a screening when he realised the film wasn’t going well:
I’m in London doing press on the film before opening weekend. And I go to Edgar Wright, ‘Hey, let’s you and me and your friends go see it on Friday night in Piccadilly.’ So Nira [Park], his producer, and Joe Cornish and the whole Edgar group, we head into the heart of Piccadilly Circus to go see Death Proof on opening day.
And we walk in the theatre and there’s about 13 people in there. On the opening 8.30 show, alright? [Laughs] That was a rather humbling experience. But we sat down and watched it and had a good time. Edgar was like: ‘That was very impressive. I think I would have turned around and walked out of there. The fact you said, ‘F–k it,’ and sat down, I admired that.'”
“Death Proof” has found a cult audience since its release, the movie said to work better now than when it originally screen. Tarantino meanwhile has gone from strength-to-strength with his subsequent films drawing better reviews and much stronger box-office.
