Day 5: From Dusk 'til Dawn (1996)

From Dusk Til Dawn (1996)
Starring: George Clooney, Quinten Tarantino, Juliette Lewis, Harvey Keitel, Salma Hayek, Tom Savini, Cheech Marin, John Hawkes, Danny Trejo
Category: FAVORITE
Plot Tags: switch-er-roo, heist, vampire/monster
Original release / release date: 1996
Format viewed: VHS (own collection - of course)
Directed by: Robert Rodriguez
Studio: Los Hooligans/ Miramax

After a brief dalliance for the Hardly Strictly Bluegrass Festival in San Francisco, I'm back on schedule and set. I'll be doubling up here over the next week to make up for the lapse in timing but that works out just fine. I thought I'd get back in the swing by getting into a couple of my favorite scary/horror movies this week along with some new releases. From Dusk Til Dawn is, quite easily, one of my all time favorites. There is so much to like but from a framework standpoint you have the following (recognizing of course that I am giving stuff away here but seems hard to spoil a movie's surprises when the box itself does it for me): the start of a bank heist movie, morally questionable heroes, morally worn out ex preacher, morally depraved biker bar south of the border and a wild mix of monsters/vampires, over-the-top action/violence/gore/monster silliness and some of the best, most enjoyable writing this side of anywhere.

Case in point (Kate= Juliette Lewis, kidnapee, Ritchie=Gecko brother, kidnapper, Quinten):

Kate: Where are you takin' us?
Ritchie: Mexico
Kate: What's in Mexico?
Ritchie: Mexicans

And another one (Seth=other kindnapper, Clooney, Gloria=first kidnapee)

Seth: You. Plant yourself in that chair.
Gloria: ...what are you gonna do with...
Seth: I said plant yourself. Plants don't talk.

I could go on forever with random quotes but rest assured, the dialogue is reliably awesome.
On to the movie itself, part of the reason this is one of my all time favorites is the seismic shift it takes midway through. Not to dissimilar to Phycho, the story starts one way and takes a hard left into batshit crazypants territory. Now, again, I don't know that I can spoil anything that the damned box already has so I don't feel much guilt in noting that the film starts with two brothers (Tarantino and Clooney) who are robbing banks en route to the Mexican border who come across a vacationing family (Keitel, Juliette Lewis) in a motorhome. The brothers co-opt the family to aid them across the border to get to a biker bar in the middle of nowhere, wait out the night and meet up with their contact in the morning. The goal being to get safe passage into southern Mexico and away from possible capture by the Texas Rangers or FBI. Simple enough.

Well, the biker bar turns out to be a den for a mass of monster-y vampires (no shimmery, glowy ones in sight) who reveal themselves after an altercation in the bar. At this point (more to a point, a line from Tom Savini's character that marks the change) do things go nuts. The dancers and workers change and begin tearing into the clientele in a mass fury. The house band (Tito and Tarantula) coverts their standard instruments into body part ones and continues playing in a highly amusing way - bodies fly, the music rips and it is just a mess of a good time. A fantastic exchange between Salma Hayek's dancer/monster character and Seth (Clooney) must be seen in context to be fully enjoyed but sufficed to say, I could relate to the dismissive notion of making him a slave. Any-ee-way, the crowd dwindles to our main heroes and the battles carries on from there. I could continue to lay out the plot, but, really, why do that? Films like this are wonderful because they are simple, they are clear and they are a blast. This is not Remains Of The Day, this is Remains Of the Bikers and that, at the right time, is just all manner of fantastic.

From the great writing and directing style to the fantastic soundtrack, great practical effects and all else, I dearly love this goofy, crazy-ass movie.