From Dusk Till DawnYou walk into a bar late at night, some rowdy place out in the middle of nowhere in Mexico, after the sun has fled behind the horizon, and you can't even begin to know what to expect; even vampires are fair game. From Dusk Till Dawn is the story of two fugitives by the name of Seth (George Clooney) and Richie Gecko (Quentin Tarantino), who are cutting a bloody swath through Texas on their way to a rendezvous across the border, fleeing the long arm of the law with their stolen take from a bank job. After taking the Fuller family hostage, including fallen preacher, Jacob (Harvey Keitel), their egress suddenly turns supernatural at the meeting spot, necessitating an uneasy alliance.
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From Dusk Till Dawn is an early collaboration between two talented filmmakers--Quentin Tarantino and Robert Rodriguez, who write and direct respectively--and it bears the earmarks of their style, one which would be later revisited in their double feature effort, Grindhouse. Like Grindhouse, From Dusk Till Dawn is a violent, bloody, sexy, gratuitous film which hearkens back to the kind of low-budget exploitation flicks that are often regarded as camp or cult classics by virtue of nostalgia. Whereas those films may qualify solely as a guilty pleasure, From Dusk Till Dawn is comprised of tight, snappy dialogue and intense action--emblematic components of the two filmmakers' respective bodies of work. From Dusk Till Dawn is a vampire movie, although the film intentionally holds off on any displays or hints at the existence of the supernatural until over halfway in; up until then, it is treated as the story of the Gecko brothers and their escape from the U.S. So when the sexy exotic dancer named Santánico Pandemonium (Salma Hayek) sways on stage with a serpent embracing her like something out of the Book of Genesis, performing at this strip club in the dusty hills of some forgotten wasteland, suddenly sprouts fangs, one of the untainted patrons calling himself "Sex Machine" (Tom Savini)--with a unique codpiece to match his ostentatious name--has a reaction that mirrors our own. Few films have the patience and are prepared to upend our expectations so dramatically as From Dusk Till Dawn does; but in keeping with the film's roots, this too is a stylistic homage to its inspirations. Many cheap exploitation films of the past were so low budget, that any big display of special effects and other hooks had to be baited for the audience, teased in the trailer, but left until the finale more or less, so as to ensure the audience stayed for the whole picture. As a result, these pictures often included expanses of dialogue-heavy scenes and altogether inexpensive stretches of filler to trick the audience into thinking they're getting their money's worth. From Dusk Till Dawn approaches this tease by the emergence of vampires late game; although it does have plenty of gunfights and explosions from the start, it still pulls the rug out from under you when the bloodsucking starts.
Seth and Richie are two very different brothers; so different, that it begs the question if they're even related, save for their penchant for violence. Seth identifies himself as a thief first, shooting his way out of the country as a last resort. Richie, on the other hand, suffers from some kind of dementia, giving him paranoid hallucinations which lead him and Seth into their bloody escalations of violence as a result. Seth is the thinker of the two, while Richie...is not--as evidenced by the way Seth gets him and Richie out of a shootout at a liquor store. Seth has an obligation to his brother beyond family, since Richie was the one who broke him out of police custody to save him from incarceration. As much trouble as Richie is, Seth feels a kind of responsibility to protect him, even if from himself. Their publicized escape from custody is broadcast over the news, which hits at a fascination that viewers have with accounts of extreme behavior; the news reporter beams an inappropriate smile describing the multitude of deaths, which are showcased like a scoreboard on the television screen. This moment suggests a tone felt throughout From Dusk Till Dawn, that people have a need to see violence through the safety and security of a television screen, which serves as a barrier between them and the scary, outside world. The Geckos certainly look villainous on the newscast, although they are more charismatic when written as the protagonists of our story. The film suggests that there is a subconscious thirst for bloodshed here, represented in the indulgent violence occupying roughly the last third of the movie. Just as the audience at home tunes in to hear of the presumed showdown with the Geckos and law enforcement, so too do we await a bloody climax to our story, one which--when it comes--spares no one from participating in the violence, including the Fullers.
When the Geckos abduct Jacob and his two children, Kate (Juliette Lewis) and Scott (Ernest Liu), there is the sense that something bad will inevitably befall the Fullers, given the fate of Seth and Richie's previous hostage; it seems ordained. The welfare of the characters in From Dusk Till Dawn is something which is never fully secure, and with frequent and explosive instances of violence, the danger the Fullers face is legitimate, even when Seth warms to his abductees at the bar. Although From Dusk Till Dawn largely establishes the Geckos as our protagonists--the Fullers are introduced later--Seth and Richie are not nice guys--they are crooks and villains, thieves and worse. They do not really engender sympathy, so it makes it nigh impossible to root for them in the face of their obstacles, which also means that our expectations as to what will happen to them also remains murky. By establishing this kind of morally ambivalent atmosphere, mixed with horror movie elements, From Dusk Till Dawn creates a sense of freefall for what will happen to the characters, courtesy of its feints and subversive turns, where even hostages are made into soldiers against the forces of darkness, partnering with their captors to survive the long night.
Recommended for: Fans of a self-aware send up to exploitation movies filled with action and monsters, shifting from one tone to another as if flipping the channel. With garish sets and over the top characters, it is an over-stylized playground and homage to a style of filmmaking by a pair of movie-loving filmmakers.
Seth and Richie are two very different brothers; so different, that it begs the question if they're even related, save for their penchant for violence. Seth identifies himself as a thief first, shooting his way out of the country as a last resort. Richie, on the other hand, suffers from some kind of dementia, giving him paranoid hallucinations which lead him and Seth into their bloody escalations of violence as a result. Seth is the thinker of the two, while Richie...is not--as evidenced by the way Seth gets him and Richie out of a shootout at a liquor store. Seth has an obligation to his brother beyond family, since Richie was the one who broke him out of police custody to save him from incarceration. As much trouble as Richie is, Seth feels a kind of responsibility to protect him, even if from himself. Their publicized escape from custody is broadcast over the news, which hits at a fascination that viewers have with accounts of extreme behavior; the news reporter beams an inappropriate smile describing the multitude of deaths, which are showcased like a scoreboard on the television screen. This moment suggests a tone felt throughout From Dusk Till Dawn, that people have a need to see violence through the safety and security of a television screen, which serves as a barrier between them and the scary, outside world. The Geckos certainly look villainous on the newscast, although they are more charismatic when written as the protagonists of our story. The film suggests that there is a subconscious thirst for bloodshed here, represented in the indulgent violence occupying roughly the last third of the movie. Just as the audience at home tunes in to hear of the presumed showdown with the Geckos and law enforcement, so too do we await a bloody climax to our story, one which--when it comes--spares no one from participating in the violence, including the Fullers.
When the Geckos abduct Jacob and his two children, Kate (Juliette Lewis) and Scott (Ernest Liu), there is the sense that something bad will inevitably befall the Fullers, given the fate of Seth and Richie's previous hostage; it seems ordained. The welfare of the characters in From Dusk Till Dawn is something which is never fully secure, and with frequent and explosive instances of violence, the danger the Fullers face is legitimate, even when Seth warms to his abductees at the bar. Although From Dusk Till Dawn largely establishes the Geckos as our protagonists--the Fullers are introduced later--Seth and Richie are not nice guys--they are crooks and villains, thieves and worse. They do not really engender sympathy, so it makes it nigh impossible to root for them in the face of their obstacles, which also means that our expectations as to what will happen to them also remains murky. By establishing this kind of morally ambivalent atmosphere, mixed with horror movie elements, From Dusk Till Dawn creates a sense of freefall for what will happen to the characters, courtesy of its feints and subversive turns, where even hostages are made into soldiers against the forces of darkness, partnering with their captors to survive the long night.
Recommended for: Fans of a self-aware send up to exploitation movies filled with action and monsters, shifting from one tone to another as if flipping the channel. With garish sets and over the top characters, it is an over-stylized playground and homage to a style of filmmaking by a pair of movie-loving filmmakers.