I don't see how HD would diminish the "mock grindhouse" look any more than watching Grindhouse in the theater would have. For its theatrical release, Grindhouse was given faux print damage and missing reels, but it was not reduced in resolution. In fact, its theatrical screening had greater resolution than HD. I'd like to see Grindhouse as close as possible to the manner in which Tarantino and Rodriguez created it, and while they saw fit to add print damage and missing reels, they did not opt to present it with only 480 lines of resolution, so I don't understand why this would be more desirable for Grindhouse than for any other film.
I guess you are missing the point of my (and other posters) argument here. I'm not saying that an HD version of the film Grindhouse would not be a more accurate replication of the experience of seeing the movie as it was presented originally in the theater, which is your point and one to which I heartily assent. What I am arguing is that an HD presentation of the film diminishes the overall "faux grindhouse" experience of the film itself simply by rendering it in a format even further removed from the original sources that inspired it.
In other words, if you really want to get into the low budget exploitation 42nd Street grindhouse and/or Vestron video spirit of the movie that Tarantino really intended, you are much better off going with the lower definition transfer. Frankly, my guess is that Tarantino would probably have filmed it in 16mm and blown it up for theatrical release if the studio would have let him get away with that.
So Grindhouse should be watched at a lower resolution than it was shown in theaters because the movies that it paid homage to or parodied looked a certain way? The look of Grindhouse was decided when the movie was made. Whatever visual look or deterioration or lack of resolution that they wanted to emulate from the old grindhouse movies was achieved when they made the movie and was shown in the theater. Capturing the look that the movie had in the theater- and not the look of other movies that inspired it- is all that should be important.
To capture the look and feel of grindhouse theaters, I could also dump various bodily fluids all over my floor, start a fight with other people that I'm watching the movie with or shoot heroin during the movie.
I don't think anyone's arguing that Grindhouse SHOULDN'T be released in HD, just that it's ironic to make a movie designed to look as bad as possible look as good as possible.
I had the extreme pleasure of watching "Grindhouse" on 35mm last night, fake trailers and all. An outdoor cinema in Perth, Western Australia had it screening, and has it for two more nights. Despite the fact that me and my mate were sitting in the pouring rain, it was a truly wonderful experience.
Having owned the DVDs for months, it was still great to see it on the big screen, chopped up, and with the trailers. But the most satisfying part was when my buddy, and boss at the video store I work at, having seen the two full films and not really liked them, said to me "I can appreciate what they were trying to do, and they succeeded".
I was a bit disappointed in the Death Proof DVD, mainly because it didn't include any "trailers" with the feature and because the first 30 mins of the movie was really dull. I didn't care about or even like the women from the first half and it wasn't until Kurt Russell turned up before it got interesting. The second half was much better, I really liked the four women, especially Zoe. Planet Terror, on the other hand, was really fun to watch. It's going to be awhile before I get to the bonus materials but I'd watch both movies again
Well, the US already has about 5 of those discs already (give or take an extra or two) if you bought the two separate releases. All we're missing is the theatrical-cut disc which will most likely show up here eventually. Yes, that's the disc a lot of us want the most, but it's not like nothing's been released here yet.