From Dusk Till Dawn Review

Written by: Ash's missing hand   

This is two different movies woven beautifully into one. It is half hostage movie and half vampire gore-fest. The first hour involves two killers and their victims, then a stripper in a Mexican bar turns into a vampire and it's off to the races. Genre-hopping is a specialty of Quentin Tarantino, who wrote the movie.

At the beginning, we meet Seth and Richard Gecko (George Clooney & Quentin Tarantino) who have just robbed a bank and left a trail of dead behind them. The body count is totaled up by a news reporter on a digital carnage readout. Richard has broken Seth out of prison, and now ther're heading for the Mexican border with the bank loot. Richard, who is a little nuts, is blasting everyone in sight on the way there.

While holed up in a dusty motel they take hostages. A former minister (Harvey Keitel) and his children (Juliette Lewis & Ernest Liu). Now the minister and his kids are heading south in a mobile home that the Geckos hope to hide in while crossing the border. In Mexico, they pull up to a strip bar called the Titty Twister. The doorman is played by Cheech Marin, who plays two other roles, as well. The kidnappers and their hostages go inside to await their money drop connections, that's when the vampire plot begins.

If you liked "Dawn of the Dead", you'll love the last 30 minutes of this movie as the plot is set aside and the movie goes for violence and F/X. There is an out of vampirism among the heroes, which reminded me of Night of the Living Dead. The movie is skillful and action packed with some neat stuff, has excellent dialogue, and is professionally done.