Online Exclusive: Horror Film Directors Dish About 'Grindhouse' Trailers

Quentin Tarantino and Robert Rodriguez have worked together a lot of times over the years: Tarantino directed a scene in Rodriguez's Sin City, Rodriguez directed Tarantino's script From Dusk Til Dawn, and the two of them both contributed segments to Four Rooms (along with Allison Anders and Alexandre Rockwell). But their greatest collaboration is probably Grindhouse, the lurid and excellent tribute to '70s exploitation film opening this weekend. (What else are you going to see this weekend: The Reaping? Does Hilary Swank have a machine gun for a leg in it? We think not.) To increase the ambience around their double bill, the Grindhouse boys recruited three horror-movie cohorts to direct fake trailers. They might be the most entertaining part of the whole package, so don't take a bathroom break at intermission.

Exclusive interviews with: Rob Zombie, Edgar Wright, Eli Roth, Robert Rodriguez and Quentin Tarantino

Rob Zombie

Rob Zombie made a career transition from the band White Zombie to directing The Devil's Rejects. His contribution to Grindhouse is a trailer for Werewolf Women of the SS; he called us from the set of the Halloween remake he's directing.

Why the Nazis?
Basically, I had two ideas. It was either going to be a Nazi movie or a women-in-prison film, and I went with the Nazis. There's all those movies like Ilsa, She Wolf of the SS; Fraulein Devil; and Love Camp 7 -- I've always found that to be the most bizarre genre.

Did you watch exploitation movies when you were a kid?
Yeah, when you lived in suburbia, drive-ins were the grindhouse theaters. My favorite triple-bill I ever saw at a drive-in was Texas Chainsaw Massacre, Mother's Day, and I believe it was Dawn of the Dead, all on one bill. That was pretty high-powered. I couldn't drive yet, I didn't have a license, so I would ride my bike to the drive-in and hop the fence, and there was a little moat that you had to cross to get to the drive-in. We would put our bikes over our heads and walk through the water and sit out there by the speakers and get devoured by mosquitoes for five hours, because we didn't want to pay.

Did you ever go to actual grindhouse theaters?
I moved to New York when I was 18 and I started going to 42nd Street. The early '80s were the last hurrah for grindhouse in New York before Giuliani cleaned it up and killed it. I saw a lot of great stuff there, a lot of stuff like Cannibal Holocaust and Make Them Die Slowly and Italian zombie movies. The 42nd Street theaters were more like homeless shelters. There's people sleeping in there, having sex. There would usually be some guy playing his radio so loud you couldn't hear the movie, and if anybody said anything, a fight would break out. Of course, all that bizarre shit adds to the charm in a particular sort of way.