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“Psychos do not explode when sunlight hits them! I don’t give a fuck how crazy they are!”
Wise words of advice if ever I heard any.
As I sit here at my computer typing up this review, a cardboard tube sits on a table behind me. Inside that cardboard tube is a rolled up movie poster for the original From Dusk Till Dawn just waiting for me to buy a frame and hang it up on a wall. Just it being there though should be enough of a hint to tip you off to the fact that I’m a fan of this flick.
Long before Grindhouse was ever even a seed of an idea in the heads of its creators, Robert Rodriguez and Quentin Tarantino collaborated on another experiment in the horror genre. The final product of that experiment was From Dusk Till Dawn, a film that adds up to be one bucking bronco of a ride. Its gory, bad ass, ultra-violent, instantly quotable, well-acted, and both fun and funny. Not to mention that its got a bevy of familiar faces (keep your eyes open for the John Saxon cameo early on), a horde of vicious monsters, more exposed breasts than you know what to do with, and, also, it just happens to be about cool as cool gets. From Dusk Till Dawn is also stupid, silly, and sleazy. And I mean that in a good way. To put it simply, From Dusk Till Dawn is more grindhouse than either Planet Terror or Death Proof, the two movies that composed the Grindhouse double feature. From Dusk Till Dawn is, at the end of the day, a pretty juvenile movie. I mean, don’t get me wrong. The writing is great. The directing is great. The acting is great. And the special effects are especially great. But, hey, this isn’t The Seventh Seal here. This is a story about a duo of criminals on the run from the law who wind up looking for refuge in a titty bar that just happens to be filled with hungry, snarling vampires. Like I said: juvenile. However, once again, I really do mean that in a good way. From Dusk Till Dawn isn’t meant to be smart. It’s meant to be fun. It’s meant to be the kind of movie that makes gore hounds stand up in the theater and cheer. It’s meant to be the kind of movie that makes you want to throw up the ol’ “devil horns” heavy metal salute and shout out “fuck yeah!” That’s what this movie was meant to be, and that’s what it is.
Fuck yeah!
“Alright ramblers, let’s get rambling.”
From Dusk Till Dawn tells the story of Richie and Seth Gecko, two brothers who also happen to be the most infamous criminals America has seen since Bonnie and Clyde. Quentin Tarantino plays Richie, a sexually perverse and mentally disturbed sicko dweeb with a mean streak, and, in doing so, offers up his only truly respectable performance as an actor to date. The man may be an awesome filmmaker, but Jack Nicholson he is not. Still, he manages to hold his own this time around and for that I applaud him. Richie’s brother Seth, the handsome rough-and-tumble “bad motherfucker” (with a heart of gold…or at least bronze) brother of the duo, is meanwhile played by George Clooney. Clooney does a fantastic job of bringing this intense character to booze-swilling, cold-cocking, monster-slaying life. Anyway, Seth and Richie are on the run following a prison break that ended in bloodshed. The two soon wind up running into a preacher by the name of Jacob and his family (son Scott and daughter Kate), all of whom they promptly kidnap. The Geckos force the family to help them sneak across the U.S.-Mexico border and, once that task is completed, the whole gang then makes their way to the Titty Twister, an over-the-top loud-as-fuck huge-as-hell nudie bar decked out with neon lights, naked girlies, and brawling bikers.
“Alright hard drinkers, let’s drink hard.”
In the bar, the Geckos narrowly avoid an altercation with the bartender (played by the immortal Danny Trejo) thanks to the intervention of the Jacob (played by the always great Harvey Keitel, here making the most of a somewhat bland part). In the bar, we also meet a few other characters that will figure in nicely in the coming chaos. Blaxploitation and post-apocalyptic b-movie icon (not to mention former football player) Fred Williamson is on hand to do what he does best, hand out ass-kickings. Tom Savini is also present, perfectly cast in the role of Sex Machine, a tough-as-nails biker armed with both a bullwhip (with which he steals a bottle of beer from freakin’ Greg Nicotero!) and a cock-and-balls shaped twelve-shot codpiece revolver. See, what did I tell you? Juvenile but cool. Why there’s never been a Sex Machine action figure on the market, I have no idea. Finally, we meet one last character. Kind enough to scorch the screen with her red-hot presence is “the mistress of the macabre” Santanico Pandemonium (nunsploitation cinema fans will get the reference immediately), who is played by none other than the curvy, super-sexy, smoldering, and brutally gorgeous Salma Hayek who treats us to a long engrossing dance of seduction. I swear, when I owned a VHS copy of this movie, it was this part of the tape that was the most worn out. I’m telling you, it’s so hot it just might burn your retinas. Salma Hayek has the body of a goddess and she knows how to move it like a devil.
“Alright vampire killers, let’s kill some vampires.”
It’s not long before Seth and Richie wind up starting a fight that, unsurprisingly, ends up causing a whole lot of blood loss. All the grue splattered about the bar is enough to drive the vampire bar staff, who has thus far been keeping secret their true nature, to expose themselves and launch into a kill-crazy rampage. As the death tolls rises, more vamps show up, in bat form, looking to get a piece of the bar-goers. The scant few survivors, however, manage to barricade the doors shut, keeping all the bats outside while they regroup and try to regain their composure. With their numbers down to only Jacob, Kate, Scott, Seth, Sex Machine, and Frost, the survivors have to band together to make it through the night alive. And the worst of it hasn’t even begun. The film reaches a crescendo when more of the survivors are picked off and those few remaining choose to wage all-out war on the vampires that besiege them.
The whole picture is just an excuse to throw gore out by the gallons and toss out one-liners left and right. And, for that, I love it. For all the ridiculous weaponry and cooler-than-The-Fonz attitude, I love it. When Seth Gecko sticks a wooden stake in a jackhammer to create a new kind of vamp-slaying weapon, I love it. When the preacher blesses condoms full of tap water to use as a weapon against the vamps, I love it. When the preacher’s daughter just happens to find a pump-action crossbow lying around (…the hell?), I love it. I love every minute of this movie.
Clearly, Rodriguez is a John Carpenter fan. Both From Dusk Till Dawn and Planet Terror have a distinctly Carpenter-esque flavor of action-horror to them, and Carpenter’s love for “siege” style set-ups where characters are isolated inside a building with hordes of villains trying to get at them is also a recurring motif for Rodriguez. Hell, even Rodriguez’ piss-poor sci-fi horror outing The Faculty had a little bit of that John Carpenter influence evident in it. And he can pull that style off well. Good for him. Granted, he’s still no replacement for John Carpenter… but who is? Try to think of From Dusk Till Dawn as a John Carpenter movie if John Carpenter was Mexican and was able to drop all his pretensions and simply let it rip with a funny, splattery, balls-out, action-packed chunk of dumb fun. Bullets, body parts, and snappy banter fly all over the place in this flick and, if you’re not careful, you might just O.D. on testosterone. Hey, its horror movies not rocket science. It’s good to just have a party every once in a while. From Dusk Till Dawn is definitely a party.
Tom Savini is great as Sex Machine. I can’t get enough of the guy. I’m a big fan and I love seeing him in this, his most popular on-screen role. He just doesn’t get enough screen time. I gotta admit, though, I never think this guy has enough screen time. One of these days, somebody needs to give Tommy boy a real lead role in a major motion picture. Sure, he’s gotten big roles in bottom-of-the-clearance-bin horror flicks from all over the place. But, dammit, I need more Tom Savini. More, more, more. Like I said, I can’t get enough of the guy.
I enjoyed the film’s portrayal of vampires immensely. I’m not much of a fan of the image of vampires as Anne Rice-style Bela Lugosi-type romanti-goth tortured souls. I like my bloodsuckers surly, nasty, and raw. Rodriguez’s vampires are just that. They’re not androgynous guys with long black hair wearing puffy white poet shirts and black fishnet. They’re sneering, growling, cranky, rude motherfuckers. They’re deformed freaks and twisted beasts with a mind towards ripping you to pieces. They’re primal. They’re animalistic. They’re the harbingers of death and they take no shit. Big teeth. Big claws. And a ravenous lust for mass slaughter. Now THAT’S a vampire. Hooo-EE!
The first half of the movie is 100% pure platinum, that’s the truth. Not long after our heroes get to the bar is when the vampires show up and when the vampires show up the whole movie mutates into something completely different. The second half of the movie is a huge leap from the first half. The first time I saw From Dusk Till Dawn I was so jarred by the abrupt shift in tone, style, and pacing that I hated it. The first time I saw this movie I thought it sucked. The second time I saw it I thought it was “only okay.” After seeing it a few more times, I’ve come to really appreciate it for the napalm-soaked burst of anarchy that it is. See, the first time I saw it I thought it was taking itself completely seriously. I entirely missed all the humor. I guess you could say that, at the time, I was usually taking myself way too seriously… and I was taking horror too seriously too. So I assumed that this movie took itself seriously as well. If any of you reading this review have never seen this movie (what? do you live under a fucking rock???), don’t bother entertaining the notion that From Dusk Till Dawn is a serious movie. Otherwise, you’ll just muck up the experience for yourself. When I first saw this flick I completely missed all the humor in it. I thought it was just badly written. Granted, it still ain’t Shakespeare. But its a good movie, and I was wrong thinking that it was so awful.
The soundtrack is one bad ass piece of business. “Dark Night”, the track by The Blasters that both opens and closes the film, acts as a perfect crusty shell surrounding the molten core that is From Dusk Till Dawn. It’s a groovy, spitwad-launching slice of twangy country-fried rockabilly that makes you wanna curl your lip up, Elvis-style, and nod your head. Every song in this flick stands out, helping the movie forge its own distinctive sonic trademark that matches the images on the screen deftly. This should come as no surprise, as both Tarantino and Rodriguez have a long and sterling history when it comes to picking out music for their pictures. Aside from “Dark Night”, some of the movie’s best cuts include Tito & Tarantula playing “Angry Cockroaches”, a rowdy piece of audio seemingly made to be scored against scenes of barroom revelry, and “She’s Just Killin’ Me”, the original track contributed by no less than the great ZZ Top (yes, ZZ Fucking Top) is a woozy, bluesy, boozy slice of lawless Southern rock. Hands down, though, the movie’s best piece of music (next to the absolute perfection in the utilization of “Dark Night”) comes in the scene where Salma Hayek graces our eyeballs with her brain-blistering and crotch-hardening dance of erotica. Few things could possibly match the entrancing visuals in that sequence, but thankfully one of those few things just happens to be “After Dark”, another cut from Tito & Tarantula that is as dark as it is sensual, and it is DAMN sensual, boy. Damn sensual. Hoo-hah!
While there are a few notable chinks in From Dusk Till Dawn’s armor (particularly its awkwardly ever-changing pace and its staunch anti-seriousness that just might leave some straight-faced horror fans scratching their head), just about all the mistakes are easily forgiven as they play right into the vibe the picture seems to try to give off of being a stupid, silly, and sleazy, but oh so fun, thrill ride. The blood and guts flows freely. No fooling, the wet, chunky, red stuff is plentiful here. Meanwhile, monster fans ought to relish the unique depiction of the vampires. Instead of just slapping some plastic fangs in the mouths of extras, each vampire actor has been painstakingly transformed into a hideous beast via the magic of prosthetic special effects. No CGI beasties here, boyo. And if you’re still not convinced that From Dusk Till Dawn is a good movie then just think of that Salma Hayek dance of seduction. If that doesn’t sell you, then few things will.
Gore, boobies, vampires, one-liners, Tom Savini, Danny Trejo, booze, bullets, an awesome soundtrack, and a spicy Latin babe dancing with a snake around her neck? Sounds like a party to me.
