Review of From Dusk Till Dawn (1996) by Azarias D — 21 Jun 2015

Back in a time, when Robert Rodriguez was an up and coming piece of hot shit, prodigy of Tarantino, wild cartoon violence and tongue firmly shoved right in cheek, he made absolute cracking films, one such film is From Dusk Till Dawn.

Yes Desperado is far superior, his adaptation of the original Sin City defined him and his latest outings with Machete have been far from stellar, but here, fueled by an on fire Tarantino script, he just sets a bench mark for indie film makers and runs with it.

The premise seems simple enough, the Gecko brothers are on the run from the FBI and Texas law enforcement, after a bloody escape from confinement. All they want to do is make it across the border to Mexico, meet up with a business partner and claim their freedom.

This isn't as easy as it sounds when one of you is a psychotic sex offender, who cant not make a scene wherever he goes and the other is a lean, mean, not giving a fuck machine. When their original plan, inevitably falls flat, the take a christian family hostage and force them to help them cross the border and sit with them until dusk, and all will be hunky dory, right? In a realistic world yeah, but its around the 45 minute mark this crime thriller decides it wants to turn itself from a tense, wise cracking spectacular into a fully fledged hilarious and gory vampire horror movie.

It is the most spectacular of twists, or was back in the day, now however you've no doubt either seen or been made aware of this now franchise. The cast, for the time and even now is overpoweringly good, George Clooney, Quentin Tarantino, Harvey Kietel, Tom Savini, John Saxon, Juliette Lewis and Salma Heyeck are but a few names, not to forget Cheech Marin and Danny Trejo, that litter the roster and every single one of them is on fucking fire.

All of them, Clooney might actually be at his best in this film, hes relentless, hard as nails, dangerous, however he is equally loving and somewhere behind the metal exterior is a heart. Tarantino actually does extremely well as his brother Richie, and down plays his psychosis with tact, Kietel is powerful as a pastor with lost faith, constantly fighting an uphill battle against his faith, family and his situation.

Lewis is fragile and surprisingly tame in this, giving off quite possibly the best character arc in the film and Salma, well wow! It helps bucket loads that Tarantino's dialogue is all over this and these veterans fire it out like its commonplace, its cheesy, funny, quirky, serious, delightful and downright ferocious at points.

The film really is a huge melting pot of ideas that should work but do. The direction is brilliant, much a film of 2 halves, it sets the characters and pacing up nicely and walking in blind to this film, you will not see the twist coming, no matter how good at guess work you are.

It sets up character, tension, a sense of danger and its all wrapped nicely in a light hearted package. Making act 2 just a full throttle, no holds barred, hardcore, cartoonish romp. Robert finds time to render each character quirky and customizable.

They all have their own traits and all of them reflect their battle status, the vampires range from frightening to outright hilarious, with Nicereto and Savini providing some wonderful practical effects.

The camera work is kinetic and the editing even more so, this is very much a Rodriguez film, but because hes not doing absolutely everything, he actually has time to have some fun and structure to his madness, which is when it works best.

Its short comings however are in the CGI, occasional over the top humour that doesnt mesh and a sense of what the fuck by the finale. I mean all of these things are essential to its well being, but if you look back and question it now, it really is just a blunderbus of quirky ideas, executed brilliantly on paper and screen.

Its preposterous, quirky and snappy fun, Clooney steals the show and proves he can be a bad ass, while still being a charmer, and the visuals, for the most part hold up. However, for a new audience to watch now, I get the feeling a lot would be lost on them, this was one of those movies that really was of its time and surroundings, Tarantino could do no wrong, Clooney was the biggest male sex symbol on the planet, Savini and Nicerto were being hired for everything and Rodriguez was firing out brilliant indie films, its very timely not timeless and I fear with time, this films charm may go completely, a must watch however.