American Grindhouse (2010)

American Grindhouse is a story about just that: Grindhouse. In America. It's a documentary over how it all started out in one particular plaza in New York, and went from being a set of movie theaters that stayed open both day and night, to the sleazy establishments we know them as now. Grindhouse went from focusing on regular film, to exploitation - a particular genre that's later become almost synonymous with the name.

I had the terminology wrong myself. Grindhouse is not equal to exploitation, it's simply the focal genre from this era; one that sought to provoke. It's said that ever since man picked up a video camera, there's been exploitation - a will to shock, and to show what others would not, and the movie delves into this in detail - frequently switching between speeches and outtakes from old and iconic film. In the beginning Grindhouse was mostly harmless, yet with time it started to show all the more skin, and soon also violence and obscenity - anything that'd stir controversy and garner a reaction from the audience.

Early Hollywood was all about exploitation, and early exploitation was not like the exploitation we think of when we think of exploitation now. Dracula... that was exploitation?! Somewhere along the way Hollywood decided to clean their name, but it was profitable, and eventually they picked it up again, and today there's really no limitations as to what the studios are allowed, or morally inclined to put out. Noir was originally an 'alternative' to Grindhouse, where references to sex or violence were suggestive rather than graphical. And for a long time you could not show sex, so you had to show a substitute, and that was violence. During times of social trouble, motion pictures did well, and the more troublesome times: the more troublesome movies.

The steps of exploitation through the ages went from suggestively sexual, to educationally sexual, burlesque, nudist, teen exploitation, beach movies, horror, action, sexploitation (the sixties and seventies we know), from nudie cutie - harmless nudity, to roughies - showing all the more brutal fantasies based on pulp magazines. In tune with increase in violence in real life, women went from being honored on screen to exploited, and after the rise of violence followed drugs, and freedom, and then came the black perspective, then women in prison - women as both aggressors and main characters, back to shock, to nazi exploitation, to straight up porn, onto parody, and slowly but surely exploitation evolved into acceptable entertainment, where Hollywood's putting out some of the most grotesque works, and even B-movie ideas are made to Blockbusters. It's a tough market for the side-genre that's become 'Grindhouse', though now we relate it to a certain 'style' of film in addition to the controversy. 'Grindhouse' is B-movie exploitation.

The documentary tells of a myriad of classic titles of which I've barely scratched the surface, such as Dracula, Freaks. Traffic in Souls, Because of Eve, Mom and Dad, Garden of Eden, Wild Ones, Bikini Beach, I was a Teenage Werewolf (oh hey, Teen Wolf inspiration there?), House on Bare Mountain, My Tale Is Hot, The Lusting Hours, Scum of the Earth, Blood Feast, The Last House on The Left, Sweet Sweetback, Hell Up In Harlem, Truck Turner, The Big Doll House, The Corpse Grinders, The 2-Headed Transplant, Ilsa, Deep Throat, Outtakes of Jaws, etcetc...

One interesting thing is how exploitation was initially excused as education, dealing with topics such as childbirth and relations. Women were the main customers, going to Grindhouse theaters to learn what they couldn't learn elsewhere, but the genre sure changed overtime. Good or bad? Freedom of expression can only be good, right? Though I do wonder if society might be better if some things were still taboo, and we didn't get dulled by a surplus of violence and obscenities. Exploitation evolved to the point where nothing was holy anymore, and now titles like Hostel are commonplace, and gore a form of entertainment as accepted as any other. It's a different world.

Whether Grindhouse changed the world for better or for worse, this was an interesting documentary. Good watch.

 rated 3/5: not bad