For the
sake of not having to write the same intro a million
different ways throughout the rest of time, just know that
this column avoids the overly long and sometimes dull
process of full film reviews and instead opts to break
things down based on what I thought going in, what happened
while I was there and what I learned at the end of it all.
Thanks for reading!
The
Breakdown - Machete
The Impression:
Another dumbed-down action flick in the nu-sploitation genre
Quentin Tarantino and Robert Rodriguez have been trying to
so hard to pull up by the bootstraps.
The Reality:
I don’t get this new wave of exploitation rehashes.
Sure, Machete is a fun flick full of senseless
violence, nudity, and a surprisingly liberal message about
immigration, but it’s also a slapped together film that gets
a free pass on its shoddy production quality and poor acting
because of its connection to exploitation film. The
exploitation films of the 1970s (grindhouse, if you will)
were rife with violence and nudity and shitty production
because, honestly, that’s all they could offer. They
didn’t have the money, and in many ways the talent, to do
any better, so they pounded their films with bloodshed and t
‘n’ a in an attempt to give their audiences something they
could enjoy.
Machete on the other hand is chock full of good
actors who are just chewing scenery to fulfill genre
requirements. The script’s dumbed down jokes and
careless plot contrivances are entertaining but unneeded.
That said, the audience I saw this film with absolutely
loved it, the gore and boobies completely blowing them away
each and every single time. I don’t know if that’s
something to be said about the American audiences love of
all things low-brow, or if I’m just too much of a stodgy
film snob to find a terrible amount of enjoyment in this
rehashed 80s action flick.
The Lesson:
I’m not the right audience for this sort of film, but that
audience certainly exists.
Noah Sanders is the blog/news editor at Light In The
Attic and a contributor at Sound On The Sound and
the KEXP blog. He also has his own
Criterion-based film site, Criterion Quest.
If you'd like to contact Noah in regards to his
writings here at Side One: Track One then please do
so
here.
- Noah Sanders
- -
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