How To Make A Horror Film
From Dusk till Dawn is a 1996 action/horror film directed by Robert Rodriguez and written by Quentin Tarantino. The movie stars George Clooney, Harvey Keitel, Quentin Tarantino, and Juliette Lewis. The film was banned in the Republic of Ireland on its release in 1996 and was unbanned in 2000.
Fugitive bank robbers and escaped prisoners, brothers Seth – (George Clooney) and Richie Gecko – (Quentin Tarantino) are fleeing the F.B.I. and Texas police. Seth Gecko is a cold, tough professional thief and anti-hero, while his younger brother Richie is a delusional, homicidal serial rapist and psychopath. During the first few minutes of the film, they first hold up and then destroy a liquor store and kill the clerk, a cop and a woman witness.
The Fuller family — Jacob (Harvey Keitel), the father and a former pastor who has experienced a crisis of faith; his son Scott (Ernest Liu); and daughter Kate (Juliette Lewis) — are on a vacation in their RV. The Fullers arrive at the motel and are promptly kidnapped by the Geckos, who force the Fullers to smuggle them past the Mexican Border. Seth and Jacob make an uneasy truce: if the Geckos can make it past the border, Jacob and his family will come out of the ordeal unharmed. They succeed and arrive at the “Titty Twister”, a strip club in the middle of a desolate wasteland, where the Geckos have agreed to be picked up by Carlos (Cheech Marin), their contact, at dawn.
Soon after entering the bar, chaos ensues as the employees and strippers are all revealed to be vampires. Most of the patrons are quickly killed, and Richie is bitten by the star stripper, Santanico Pandemonium (Salma Hayek), and bleeds to death. Only Seth, Jacob, Kate, and Scott survive, along with a biker named Sex Machine (Tom Savini) and Frost (Fred Williamson), a Vietnam War veteran. They manage to kill the vampires in the bar, but their problems only multiply when the slain patrons — including Richie — are brought back to life as vampires, forcing Seth to kill his brother with a stake to the heart.
During the struggle, one of the vampires bites Sex Machine in the arm. Subsequently, Sex Machine turns into a vampire and bites Frost and Jacob. During the struggle, the makeshift barricades they have erected are breached, and an army of vampires (bats at first) invade from the outside. Seth, Kate, Scott and Jacob escape to a back room, and fashion weapons from items found in the storeroom, including a pneumatic drill, crossbow, shotgun and holy water.
The four then make their final assault on the undead, during which course most of the protagonists are killed, leaving only Seth and Kate alive. They quickly get surrounded by the vampires, but then streams of sunlight shine through holes in the walls. Just then, Carlos attempts to enter the building. On Seth’s call, his bodyguards blast open the door, letting in the sunlight and causing every vampire to die in a massive explosion. Kate and Seth go their separate ways after he leaves her some cash.
As they leave, the camera pans back to reveal that the “Titty Twister” was actually the top of a buried ancient Aztec temple, presumably the home of vampires for centuries, and reveals hundreds of trucks and bikes that have been toppled down the side of the cliff following their owners’ untimely demise.
Tags: From Dusk Till Dawn