Grindhouse isn't a movie -- it's a theme park attraction. I know that doesn't sound like a compliment, and even though I'm saying it with some amount of smirky enthusiasm, this statement serves a purpose. Viewers approaching Grindhouse without the knowledge of what they're getting into might find it no fun at all. This movie isn't for everybody -- but it's definitely for people in on its joke and those who may already embrace or have the potential to appreciate the movie's aims of re-creating a certain experience using just the big screen, without the added benefit of a surrounding theme park.

The experience I'm referring to involves attending a rundown low-rent theater during the '70s, catching a double feature of exploitation flicks possibly featuring zombies, car chases, nude women, and bad dialogue, on prints that have been run through a projector so many times their scratches make them barely viewable. To filmmakers like Robert Rodriguez and Quentin Tarantino -- who may have come of age in such environments -- such scratches are as notalgic as listening to the crackles on an old LP. Only the music coming from the speakers would be punk tunes, rather than studio pop or classical jazz.

Thus, Grindhouse could be seen as something of a stunt re-enactment, like any other enterprise that might seek to cash in on old memories. The feature includes  two movies, approximately 80 minutes per -- Rodriguez's "Planet Terror" and Tarantino's "Death Proof" -- with fake trailers for exploitation movies sprinkled in here and there. The movies in and of themselves resist traditional individual criticism, as everything is an equal part of the show. With Rodriguez diving headfirst into B-movie cheese, and Tarantino focusing on a singular exploitation theme -- revenge -- the parts create a greater sum.

Much of the value in watching Grindhouse comes from observing its relief against the landscape of current cinema. It becomes easily apparent what the presence of grindhouse cinema a few decades ago might've meant to young movie enthusiasts looking for an outlet for their adolescent urges. Such movies didn't survive to the present day, so the youths have turned to other means for their outlets -- perhaps video games, or the internet. This movie then serves as a stark reminder of what similar alternatives are missing in the land of movie theaters today -- rebel cinema, cinema with a lurid voice and just the right amount of disposibility to be "discovered" by the more adventurous moviegoers. Never mind that these movies might not have been "good" in the mainstream sense.

Anyhow, all my previous comments would be just airy theory if the movie itself wasn't as much fun as it is -- and, frankly, as fortuitously constructed. Although Grindhouse is postmodern by design, the filmmakers have made sure their involvement is spirited and appropriate, with less winking and more blatant outrageousness. The trailers make a good starting point -- Rodriguez's own kicks off the action sporting some wickedly funny one-liners and money shots, and the three during the "intermission" are uniquely perverse, starting with a way-silly one by Rob Zombie and ending with an Eli Roth number that reminded me of the display sleeves of those quick-buck horror movies that adorned my parents' video store when I was a teen -- I Dismember Mama, Faces of Death, Body Shop, etc. But my favorite was the one in the middle by Edgar "Shaun of the Dead" Wright, a work of wonderful comic timing, which is all I'll say about it.

Mainly, though, it's the juxtaposition of Grindhouse's main parts that makes the whole work as well as it does. "Planet Terror" comes first, and it's all immediate gratification, everything you're expecting this movie experience theme park ride to be. Strippers! Zombies! Trucks! Motorcycles! Blood! Guts! And characters with secret pasts and contentious relationships, at locations from the hospital to a steak diner to a military base. It's totally ridiculous and quite a ball, as long as you can stomach the gore, which there's no shortage of.

But just when you're expecting more of the same from "Death Proof," you're thrown off-balance. This segment seems slow and talky, and for about an hour you'll have no idea where it's going. Suffice it to say the payoff is very much worth the wait, and viewer patience will be rewarded.

If Tarantino's section was indeed more of the same, frankly the whole movie might've started getting old. But "Death Proof" makes the whole ride feel very satisfying -- we've had our straightforward pleasures, so now we should be able to handle a slow build/punchline scenario. The segment also provides the kind of food for thought that invites a deeper analysis. It couldn't be more simplistic as a story, but  the movie actually works as a conscience-of-society piece, making a strong case, rather ironically, against the objectification of women.

"Death Proof" carries grindhouse intentions but is almost too professionally executed. One could say it consciously emulates the bait-and-swtich tactics of the lesser exploitation movies -- while posters promise action and sleaziness, the movie might deliver mostly talking with one or two lame action scenes -- but then that doesn't account for the exhilirating pace of its ending. The dialogue is too well thought-out, and the scenes of terror are honestly intense and convincing. Does this, then, make it better or worse than Rodriguez's straight standard? That debate doesn't matter -- what does is how one ultimately balances the other, and how Grindhouse as a whole makes the case for exploitation films in terms of their capacities to be guilty pleasures, their potential as a distinct formative experience, and their legitimacy for classification as significant cultural objects and art. The entire package, then, is as much thesis as it is a wild theme park ride.

(Released by Miramax Films and rated "R" for strong graphic bloody violence and gore, pervasive language, some sexuality and drug use.)

Review also posted at www.windowtothemovie.com.