Hi! I'm so glad you found my site. Please post a comment of what you think and how you got here.
Hopefully you're here because you already love or want to love the exploitation tradition in American cinema. You will find reviews of amazing grindhouse gems that you should definitely rent, trailers for classic and modern exploitation flicks, and books for further reading (see sidebar). I will focus on American exploitation films from 1965-1985, and their modern counterparts.
Some basic information (thanks to Wikipedia) to get you started:
A grindhouse is an term for an American theater that mainly showed exploitation films. Exploitation films exploit often lurid subject matter. Films need something to "exploit" in their marketing, such as a big star, special effects, sex, etc. Since these films were low-budget (as low as $5,000) and often starred unknowns, they relied heavily on sex and violence. These independent films were often unexpectedly huge hits.
Sub-genres:
action, biker, blaxploitation (starring African-Americans), britsploitation (set in England), cannibal, carsploitation (car chases), chambara (non-traditional Samurai), drive-in films, eschploitation (apocalyptic thrillers), hixploitation (American South stereotypes), horror, martial art, mexploitation (starring Mexicans, set in Mexico), mondo (fake, shocking documentaries), nature run amok (ex/ Jaws), nazi exploitation, ninja, nunsploitation (nuns in dangerous or erotic situations), propaganda, rape-revenge, revenge, sexploitation, shock exploitation (very graphic), slashers, spaghetti westerns (Italian-made Westerns), splatter (gore focused horror), stoner (show marijuana use comedically), teensploitation (starring teenagers), women in prison, zombies
The premise of this blog is that, in attempting to exploit the most vulnerable and eroticized members of society, women, low-income people, blacks, Hispanics, and other non-white ethnic groups, these films achieved some change in the opposite direction, showing capable much-to-be reckoned with characters in these groups. These films correspond with the rise of feminism, civil rights, understanding of the crime of rape, and the rise of a new, more compassionate white male prototype.
