Rose McGowan is Cherry Darling in Robert Rodriguez's "Planet Terror," one half of the "Grindhouse" double feature.

By Barry Paris, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette

Box-office gross will depend on gross-out appeal: "Grindhouse," Quentin Tarantino's and Robert Rodriguez's joint homage to shock-schlock thrillers of yore, combines two feature-length B-films into one 190-minute double-bill -- with fake trailers for the likes of "Werewolf Women of the S.S." in between.

		'Grindhouse' Directors: Robert Rodriguez and Quentin Tarantino. Starring: Rose McGowan, Freddy Rodriguez, Kurt Russell, Tom Savini. Rating: R for extreme violence and language. Web site: www.grindhousemovie.net/

After a strong dose of post-preview smelling salts, I am here to report:

Segment No. 1: Writer-director Rodriguez' "Planet Terror" has a small-town sheriff (Michael Biehn), a go-go dancer named Cherry (Rose McGowan) and her heroic ex-boyfriend Wray (Freddy Rodriguez) taking on a murderous zombie army. Cherry planned to quit stripping and become a stand-up comedian until the zombies tore off and ate one lower limb, leaving her without a leg to stand on.

But Freddy sticks in a peg, and Cherry is good to go, later trading in her prosthesis for an NRA-approved assault weapon, which she puts to excellent use at her equivalent of the Alamo -- a Texas barbecue joint called "The Bone Shack." There, she and Pittsburgh's own immortal Tom Savini (missing his wedding ring, as well as the finger that held it) help defeat the evil Bruce Willis, whose ulcerous exploding boils have something to do with a bio-terrorism plot that created all these zombies in the first place.

Except for the hilarious embellishment of McGowan's peg-leg character, Rodriguez's "Planet" -- notwithstanding its state-of-the-art mayhem, blowing and chopping off zombie heads with helicopter blades like a Waring blender -- is nothing but a gratuitous remake of the sainted George Romero's "Night of the Living Dead."

Segment No. 2: Quentin Tarantino's "Death Proof" is a different and much better story, in which a psychopath called Stuntman Mike (Kurt Russell) stalks and kills gorgeous chicks with his car. The gorgeous, attitudinous chicks in particular include Pam (Rose McGowan), Abby (Rosario Dawson), Arlene (Vanessa Ferlito) and Zoe Bell as "herself."

Their segment includes a truly astonishing car chase sequence and sadistically happy-ever-after ending.

Tarantino himself plays minor but memorable deranged roles in both segments. But unlike Rodriguez's "Planet," which delivers pyrotechnic kicks here and there, "Death Proof" is a breathless adrenaline jag, thanks to the fab raunchy dialogue and the ladies' dementedly inspired performances.

Tarantino's refashioning of the genre for today's audience is an exhibition of his uniquely trashy "grindhouse" artistic temperament.

Be warned: The beyond-the-pale, repulsively graphic violence here is epitomized by a recurring motif of testicles (some in formaldehyde jars, some not) that are sliced off a variety of victims -- a true challenge as to whether your sense of sadistic humor can overcome your intrinsic human squeamishness.

Both halves of the show are diabolical and misogynist affairs. When the victims are "bad" to start with (like Janet Leigh in "Psycho"), it's OK to zap them.

There were many walk-outs at the preview screening -- folks who evidently didn't appreciate this hindsight celebration of a low-grade "innocent" entertainment, with or without the "genuine" graininess and scratches on the film.

Cast kudos to Rodriguez, Dawson, McGowan and Russell (for his character's over-the-hill stunt work on "The Virginian," "Las Vegas" and "Gone in 60 Seconds").

All in all, this is Tarantino's "Creepshow" -- a monumentally pointless, grotesque but playful exercise in the movie-going experience.