The Way Out of the Forest

Death Proof (2007)
directed by Quentin Tarantino
rating: 5 out of 5 cravats
on DVD from the vaults

I'm fortunate to have two friends with the right takes on Death Proof. In the movie's first half, says Sam, we're told that no one remembers stuntmen anymore; in the second half, we meet a stuntman. She gets herself on the hood of a car and stays there. The girls say her name about a thousand times. Zoë Bell. Zoë the great.

Andy's post is here. David Thomson (sorry) wrote that Godard divorced Anna Karina because he only saw her - like everything - through movies. No Anna but the face in the dark. I think Tarantino is just the opposite. The overriding impression at the end of a movie like Death Proof is that women like this are everywhere, Tasmania to Texas.

So there's not much I can add except to triangulate. When Rosario Dawson realizes that the man behind the counter at the gas station in Tennessee has an issue of Italian Vogue to sell, she asks the cheerleader outside to go halfsies. Vogue is best passed back and forth; Death Proof is best with friends. Best of the year, sincerely.