Green’s Dictionary of Slang

1. a cinema that shows continuous performances; these were second-rate theatres, rarely showing any first-run feature films, often screening pornography; thus grind flick, the film exhibited [the physical turning of the early projectors, similar to the rotation of the arm of a coffee grinder + the second-rate films, which a studio simply ‘grinds out’].

1925		L.A. Times 10 Oct. 2/3: An agreement was later made by the Motion-Picture Theater Owners’ Association of Southern California, it was said, where payment will be respectively $3 higher in suburban houses, $5 higher in downtown ‘grind’ houses and $8 in de luxe theaters .
1936		G.J. Nathan Theatre of the Moment 142: The once famous Palace theatre, the greatest of vaudeville theatres, now a second- and third- run movie ‘grind’ house.
1948		Billboard 18 Sept. 38: A good picture playing a grind house eight or nine shows a day will bring in more than a vaude-pic combo limited to four or five.
1951		Green & Laurie Show Biz from Vaude to Video 568: Grind house – continuous performance theater.
1962		S. Longstreet Flesh Peddlers (1964) 164: A grind house of double features.
1970		E. Tidyman Shaft 14: The twenty-four hour movie grind houses between Seventh and Eighth.
1981		J. Brooks Front Row Center 90: In the 1930s and forties, vaudeville vanished, and the theatre became a neighborhood ‘grind’ house: movies all day and into the night.
1994		(con. 1930s) R.P. McNamara Times Square Hustler 20: Theaters then began showing pornographic films, commonly called ‘grind flicks,’ because of the number of times a movie could be shown in the course of a day.
2001		N. Tosches Where Dead Voices Gather (ms.) 346: The forty ‘C’ theaters in the Kemp circuit were known as ‘grind houses’ [...] these theaters presented ‘primarily cowboy movies, often along with the personal appearance of one of its stars’.
2007		Guardian 3 Mar. 🌐 That’s a grindhouse, pure and simple [...] showing films all night to misfits and perverts, insomniacs and onanists, businessmen with hats hiding their hard-ons and sailors dodging the Shore Patrol [...] the lowest, rawest fare unspooling on a filthy screen.

2. attrib. use of sense 1.

1964		E. Wilson Earl Wilson’s New York 15: [T]he Crossroads Cafe was once called ‘Steuben’s.’ The 42nd Street ‘grind house’ movie theaters are diagonally opposite.
1997		R. Palmer Paul Blaisdell, Monster Maker 18: [...] cheap black-and-white programmers destined for quick playoffs on the drive-in and grind-house circuit.
1999		Guardian Guide 5–12 June 21: Page, who appeared nude [...] in barrack-friendly mags and grindhouse movie-loops.
2000		D.A. Cook Lost Illusions 3: Exploitation cinema (extremely low-budget films targeted for ethnic or ‘grind house’ markets) existed at the margins of the system.
2010		Codella and Bennett Alphaville (2011) 39: The campy grindhouse gore and crime onscreen paled in comparison with the action [...] on ‘the deuce’.
2013		T. Piccirilli Last Whisper in the Dark 150: Narrative arcs in horror flicks seemed to go out with the grindhouse movie theaters on Forty-second Street.

3. (orig. US black) a strip club.

1930		S.J. Perelman in Marschall That Old Gang o’ Mine (1984) 104: Here’s one the hip wavers in the grind houses will be plugging from the runways in a month or two.
1938		H.M. Anderson Strip Tease 38: The fact that there’s practically no audience turnover [...] make it tough as hell for comedians who are playing a grind house.
1951		Green & Laurie Show Biz from Vaude to Video.
1975		J. Roe The Same Old Grind 198: Elly Mae became aware of a power she had not possessed [...] at the grind house or carnival tent.
1994		R.H. Weinberg et al. 100 Crooked Little Crime Stories 410: [...] staring as openly as front-row customers in a grind house.
2000		(con. 1940s–60s) Décharné Straight from the Fridge Dad 78: Grind house Striptease joint.

4. see grind joint n.²