"Grindhouse" - Opening on Good Friday; "This Film is Not Yet Rated"

How funny is it that Grindhouse, Quentin Tarantino and Robert Rodriguez's tribute to classic low-budget trash cinema is opening on Good Friday?

Pretty damn funny, if you ask me.

Of course, the MPAA seems to have had the last laugh--the movie got cut down to an "R" rating. Those fuckers. According to industry buzz over the past few weeks, extensive cutting had to be made. Here's an older article on the subject--this is probably not the original source, since there were only about 52,000 Google matches on this subject (and I'm positive this is not the original title): “Grindhouse” Should Be Renamed “Porn House” Some of the choicer tidbits:

there’s no question it’s headed for an NC-17 without big cuts,” says a Page Six operative, who got a sneak peek at the most over-the-top footage.

“Grindhouse” is actually two short movies - one directed by Tarantino, the other by Rodriguez - with an intermission between them. During the break, a series of fake trailers will be shown for such fictitious titles as “Werewolf Women of the SS,” directed by Rob Zombie.

“In one scene, a cute, topless girl is roughly tied down on a table by evil female Nazi experimenters who begin draining her blood and, as she screams in agony, they brand her like livestock with a coal-hot steel swastika,” our source said. “And every girl in the Nazi concentration camp is topless.”

Another trailer, directed by Eli Roth, of “Hostel” fame, is called “Thanksgiving,” in which a town’s celebration of Turkey Day is interrupted by a mad slasher.

“There’s a part where Jordan Ladd [daughter of Cheryl Ladd of ‘Charlie’s Angels’] is in a car with her boyfriend and giving him [oral sex] when she lovingly reaches to stroke his hair and discovers his neck is just a bloody stump - some maniac had just cut off his head while she was in the act.”

Later, a frisky cheerleader climbs onto a trampoline and begins stripping naked as she jumps up and down until she does a split and her skirt blows up without panties underneath. “You get the full ‘Britney Spears-getting-out-of-the-limo view,’ ” our source says. Another jolting scene shows a grossly obese man chewing on a baby.

I'm guessing all of that will either be removed entirely, or cut down to meaninglessness. So much for authenticity. Screw the MPAA. Yes, you'll be able to see it all on the unrated DVD, but if you think you're getting anywhere near the level of viewing quality on a DVD that you would be in a real theater, all I can say is, either you're a dumbshit, or else you need to get your eyes checked.

Seriously, this is the United States of fucking America, so why can't we see the original movie, as it was intended to be seen, in a real fucking theater? It's not like they're going to let the little kiddies in anyway, are they?

Incidentally, if you want to see a really good exposé of the MPAA, be sure to rent This Film is Not Yet Rated, a fairly well-done documentary on the subject. The producers of the film went so far as to hire private investigators to track down the identities of the people on the super-secret MPAA ratings board, and the even-more-secret appeals board. This appeals board is, surprisingly, entirely staffed by reps from big movie studios and major theater chains. There are also two priests, one Catholic and one Episcopalian, who oversee the proceedings of this board. So much for objectivity and fairness, eh?