“Grindhouse” surpasses the mere homage and presents a bulging B-movie muscle-flex through the expertise of two of Hollywood’s most cunning trash-film sages and a gracious budget.

Robert Rodriguez and Quentin Tarantino’s genre-split film successfully delivers the back-to-back exploitation overload it intends, but not without its shortcomings.

Surprisingly, it is Rodriguez’s contribution, “Planet Terror,” that manages to earn the gold star while Tarantino’s “Death Proof” is left playing second fiddle. “Death Proof” isn’t a bad movie, nor is it poorly crafted, but it isn’t the strongest film of the two.

As in the “Kill Bill”-duology, Tarantino is self-conscious and indulgent and shows restraint in the wrong places, where Rodriguez stays more consistent throughout and taps into the genre in a more playful and direct manner.

The production values of “Grindhouse” are terrific. From the purposefully weathered and grainy shots to the missing film reels, the washed out colors, and the B-movie gore, Tarantino and especially Rodriguez nail the look for “Grindhouse.”

The split-film opens with “Planet Terror,” Rodriguez’ lovingly over-the-top zombie flick. A small town in Texas gets overrun by “sickos,” and from there on it is pure mayhem. An unlikely band of anti-heroes (including a one-legged go-go dancer, her dagger-wielding ex-boyfriend with a shady past, and a lesbian pharmacist) engage in a desperate struggle for their lives.

“Planet Terror” is exquisitely untasteful in its presentation. In the spirit of the B-movies that inspired it, every single scene or idea that can be taken too far is taken too far, and then further yet.

The main character of “Planet Terror” is Cherry Darling (Rose McGowan), who is a stripper. She loses her leg to zombies, and then it is replaced with a machine gun, a machine gun that shoots rockets. And so “Planet Terror” continues, for its whole duration.

Discussing the acting in a move like “Planet Terror” might seem superfluous, but the cast manages to pull off the bad lines just the right way. The line between parody and brilliance is fine. McGowan does the best job, and her brief part in “Death Proof” is also solid.

“Planet Terror” mixes the hilarious and the grotesque to great affect. It has some of the most disgusting shots caught on film in the past 20 years. The grossness is obviously flagged though, so those who wish to remain sane are given time to close their eyes.

“Planet Terror” delivers that spoofy apocalyptic feel it tries to emulate with a strong presence. Rodriguez never takes himself or the movie too seriously, which becomes one of the film’s greatest assets.

The glue that binds the two feature presentations are the humorous, fake trailers, all directed by talents of he industry. The best ones are “Machete,” (by Rodriguez), which is a high octane action movie with Danny Trejo as a stone-cold Mexican assassin, and “Thanksgiving,” (by Eli Roth who also directed “Hostel”) the holiday horror that promises no leftovers.

Kurt Russell stars in “Death Proof,” a role he assumingly got for his portrayal of Snake Plissken in “Escape from New York.” The leading man of “Planet Terror,” Wray (Freddy Rodriguez), basically is Snake Plissken. That means two Snake Plisskens in the same movie. It is a masterful ploy that works particularly well within context.

“Death Proof” is an odd mash-up of the old school slasher movie and car chase films Ala “Vanishing Point.” The premise is that Stuntman Mike (Russell) picks up women at local bars, or scouts them out, and then kills them with his car.

Tarantino’s contribution to “Grindhouse” is an awkward one. Having already seen the entertaining “Planet Terror,” and then the laugh-out-loud trailers, you are plunged from excited and wanting more into a poorly paced chick flick with the focus on drinking tequila and gossiping.

There are introduction scenes for two gangs of women that are drawn out and fail to capture any sympathies. Everyone and his grandma knows that Tarantino writes sharp dialogue by now, but here his wit gets old fast.

Five minutes with this menagerie of wild vixens would have made the point, but instead Tarantino obsesses about their importance and slips. His one flaw has always been a lack of self-editing, and here Tarantino makes a mess of something that should have (and could have) been framed tighter.

It is a shame, because the scenes that do work in “Death Proof” are wonderful, such as the death-defying car chases, and all parts where the stylish soundtrack is featured. Props must go up to Tarantino for not using CGI to shoot the car chases.

Two actors who really pull through for the last stretch of “Grindhouse” are stuntwoman Zoe Bell (playing herself!) and Russell. The rest of the cast feels too blunt and are reduced to pottymouths on pretty faces.

Bell, obviously not an actor, still manages to shine through with her charm and energy, and Russell actually comes off as more sympathetic than a lot of the women, despite being a serial killer.

Ultimately “Grindhouse” triumphs outweigh its blunders, but it is hard to leave the movie theatre without the feeling that it was a shame Tarantino couldn’t have tightened up his vision for the good of the overall experience.