FROM DUSK TILL DAWN
A film review by John Robertson
Copyright 1996 John Robertson
Directed by: Robert Rodriguez Screenplay by: Quentin Tarantino Starring: George Clooney, Quentin Tarantino, Harvey Keitel, Juliette Lewis, Cheech Marin
Perfect Person Rating*: The Perfect Person for this film is Joe Bob Briggs. Although I haven't heard what Joe Bob thinks of this movie, my guess would be that he likes it, a lot. See the review below for more information.
Joe Bob Briggs is a fictional persona who writes movie reviews and books. Though it may surprise some, much of what I learned about reviewing comes from him. To Joe Bob, the most important things in a movie are, roughly, 'What's the body count?', 'How many breasts do you see?', 'Do heads roll?' and 'Can any person in this movie die at any moment?'. Though Joe Bob traditionally rates drive-in movies, I have a feeling that he would really, really like this movie.
>From Dusk Till Dawn is thought by many to be the next Quentin Tarantino film, when in fact, it's really the next Paul Rodriguez film. Appropriately, expect style over substance, even though there is a great deal of substance in this film. One thing that is central to this film that I would expect from neither Rodriguez nor Tarantino is the huge plot and tone shift that the film makes approximately two thirds of the way through.
The film begins in a typically Tarantino way, with clever dialog that you wish would make up the whole movie. In this case, it's a Texas ranger talking with a clerk in a liquor store. The ranger is so gritty, and his speech is so interesting, you wish the movie was about him, but as you might suspect, this ranger is not going to be in the movie long. The film is really about Seth and Richie Gecko, played by George Clooney and Quentin Tarantino, two men hiding in the back of the liquor store with hostages, waiting for the ranger to leave. Seth is tattooed, tough and cool, while Richie is clever, brutal, and a psychopath. Thanks to Richie's dementia, the ranger and the clerk meet sudden, violent, and in one case, very spectacular deaths. Scene one ends, the rock music starts, and the opening credits roll. Up until this point, the movie is as good as either Tarantino or Rodriguez have ever done.
Seth and Richie are headed to Mexico with a hostage in their trunk, after Richie broke Seth out of prison and the two of them held up a bank. Along the way, they kidnap the family and motor home of a preacher, played by Harvey Keitel, who has abandoned his faith. Using the RV and the preacher's family as cover, Seth and Richie make it to Mexico, where they are scheduled to rendezvous with a local crime boss who will take them in and help them launder their money. The meeting is scheduled to happen at a bar called the Titty Twister, and it's here that things soon get out of hand.
Outside the bar is Cheech Marin, playing a barker of sorts, trying to attract bikers and truckers to the bar. Marin actually plays three roles in this film, but this one is the most memorable, mostly because his chant uses the word "pussy" more times that anyone would think is possible.
Inside the bar, which seems like paradise to Seth and Richie and hell to the preacher, Jacob, and his family; topless women gyrate, bikers brawl, and the locals menace in a feast for the eyes and ears. After some scene building, the main attraction, a dancer who is called the queen of evil appears and dances for Richie. Soon, Richie's psychoses and some extra attention from the locals lead to a deadly fight between Seth, Richie and the bouncers. After the fight, Richie is bleeding profusely from his hand, and this mesmerizes the dancer. At this point, the movie takes the aforementioned plot and tone shift that had my jaw dropping to the floor.
Before describing what happens next, I should say that I have never seen a movie make a "left turn" like this. If you can imagine an Ingmar Bergman film suddenly turning into a Zucker brothers' Naked Gun movie two thirds through, you can maybe imagine the change in tone.
The dancer, enthralled with the blood dripping from Richie's wound, can take no more, and morphs into a bat-like vampire, attacking Richie. This signals feeding time to the many other vampires in the room, and soon you have a supernatural barfight of epic proportions underway. Camp, kitsch and non-sequiters rule the film suddenly, as the movie turns into a monster movie extraordinaire. If you've seen Evil Dead, or Dead Alive, you're about ready for the type and tempo of the action that ensues, but if you're not prepared, you'll be shocked. There are more deaths per minute than a Rambo movie suddenly, and it's all done with very impressive effects.
The climax of the movie is as violent and over the top as any I've ever seen, and then slowly winds down to tone that was present before, literally, all hell broke loose. Shaking my head, I left the theatre awed and puzzled by what I'd seen.
This movie isn't for everyone, clearly, and so the "Perfect Person Rating" is pretty important here. Obviously, someone who likes their movies visceral, with lots of violence, nudity, and gore will love this movie, particularly the latter half. There is more here though, both in things to attract people to the movie and in things to warn about. The acting of all characters, but particularly Clooney and, surprisingly, Tarantino, is very impressive. Only Keitel and Juliette Lewis seem stiff, and it's easy to understand. As mentioned before, the special effects are very good, as is the score and the screenplay, which is the main strength of the first half of the movie. The main reason that someone wouldn't like this movie is the abrupt tone change when the vampires make their presence known. Throughout the latter half of the movie, I kept thinking to myself that this movie was violating some unwritten rule that a movie should put itself into a category and stay there. Some people might appreciate the daring it took to make a movie like this, but others will probably just be unpleasantly confused.
--------------------------------------------------------------------- Copyright 1996 by John Robertson. Retransmit freely if unedited. My opinions are solely my own, and in no way reflect those of my employer.
* Perfect Person Rating: The Perfect Person Rating is an attempt to give the reader a new way of understanding my rating. Rather than give a film a score, either overall, or on several attributes, the Perfect Person Rating tries to identify the type of person would enjoy this movie the most. Since a reviewer is by nature someone with a great deal of experience in what they are reviewing, their experience may not be the same as someone who is less informed, less jaded, or more attuned to the subject. Hopefully the Perfect Person Rating will go further toward eliminating reviewer bias than a simple rating scale. Comments are appreciated.
The review above was posted to the
rec.arts.movies.reviews newsgroup (de.rec.film.kritiken for German reviews).
The Internet Movie Database accepts no responsibility for the contents of the
review and has no editorial control. Unless stated otherwise, the copyright
belongs to the author.
Please direct comments/criticisms of the review to relevant newsgroups.
Broken URLs inthe reviews are the responsibility of the author.
The formatting of the review is likely to differ from the original due
to ASCII to HTML conversion.
Related links: index of all rec.arts.movies.reviews reviews