From Dusk Till Dawn

February 20, 2004

Quentin Tarantino + Robert Rodriguez = A bloodbath.
Quentin Tarantino + Robert Rodriguez + Vampires = A BIG fucking bloodbath.

Cliches, cliches and more cliches – when it comes to vampire movies, that’s what I like. I don’t want my vampires walking around in the daytime. But what I appreciate more than cliches, is when a movie acknowledges those cliches and finds clever ways to either get around them (I.E. the Jewish vampire in Fearless Vampire Killers) or use them to our hero’s advantage (I.E. Robert Loggia’s garlicky Italian Mob Boss in Innocent Blood). From Dusk Till Dawn achieves both. Staking through the heart? Sure…with a pencil. Holy water? Condoms full of it. Killing vampires with sunlight? Definitely…with a disco ball.

I’m not a big George Clooney fan. I don’t have anything against him – I loved him when he was on The Facts of Life – but he normally doesn’t leave any kind of lasting impression on me. Even so, Seth Gecko should have gotten him a lot more street cred than it did. Too bad he will forever be known as ‘the shittiest Batman ever.’

Tarantino’s part in this film is really freaky. He just looked like he was having too much fun playing a sociopathic rapist/murder. I gotta wonder – when he wrote the screenplay, did he intentionally write that part for himself? Probably…

I have to watch From Dusk Till Dawn every time it comes on cable, even though I have the DVD. It’s just an asskickin’ time. However, I once made the mistake of watching it on basic cable – TNT, TBS, or some shit – which was asskickin’, but not an asskickin’ time. The Titty Twister became the Kitty Twister and what is a ‘mothertrucker’ exactly? With 90% of the gore cut out of the film, there’s not a lot left…certainly not enough left to make me want to watch it.