Putting aside that fact that Death Proof was a horrendous car wreck of a movie (I love Tarantino, but this project was sub par for his standards to say the least), the overall idea and experience of Grindhouse was a fun one. It was also a pretty daring thing to try (the whole genre approach with a double feature). I was really hoping that the public (us) would reward the Weinsteins for having faith and funding the project and for trying something different and new. But we have not.
The opening weekend for Grindhouse was disappointing to say the least. Some people suggested that the film would pick up momentum as word got out about how good it was… but that hasn’t happened either. Grindhouse dropped by over 70% in its second weekend and came in 10th place brining in only $4 million. As of right now the movie has scored only $19 million in total. Considering the Weinsteins put up $67 million for this movie (not including marketing), they are being harshly punished financially for taking the risk and trying something different. And that’s a shame.
What makes this even worse is that nothing really of note opened this week either. Disturbia, Perfect Stranger, Pathfinder???
Some people tried to blame Grindhouse’s opening weekend failure on it being Easter weekend… but that wasn’t it. Nothing was stopping people who wanted to see Grindhouse from seeing it this week… yet no one went. over 2600 almost empty theaters across North America tell us something else was wrong.
You may not have loved or even liked Grindhouse… but you had to at least admire these guys for trying something different. And I really wish we had rewarded them for it. Because all Grindhouse’s failure has done, is told Hollywood “We the people want formula, and we fear things that are different”. And Hollywood will be more than happy to just give us what we ask for.
