Westerns in March: From Dusk Til Dawn (1996)

from dusk till dawn poster

I first watched From Dusk till Dawn in the theater when it came out. I liked the first half a lot more than the second. It felt more like a Quentin Tarantino film with its interesting dialogue and stylistic flourishes. The back half was too goopy and gore-filled for my tastes at that moment. It had some fun dialogue, and I certainly wasn’t going to complain about that Salma Hayek dance number, but it seemed like a completely different film than the first half, and I didn’t enjoy it nearly as much.

I do remember immediately after watching it having long conversations with my buddies about the film. We loved that opening scene and those little stylistic flourishes, like how Richie Gecko (Tarantino) imagines Kate (Juliette Lewis) saying something crude to him, or how they do a little X-ray vision of the trunk of the car showing the kidnap victim inside. We all agreed that once the vampires show up, the film takes a dip.

I can’t remember if I watched it anymore during my college years, probably so, but then I took a very long break from it. I watched it again maybe ten years ago, and I didn’t like it at all. I felt the first half felt more like someone trying to write like Tarantino instead of an actual script written by him. It no longer thrilled. And the back half was even worse, just puerile horror that was more interested in goopy explosions than telling a story.

But Ryan Coogler was clearly influenced by this film, and I keep seeing people on the worst social media site basically saying that Sinners was a poor imitation of From Dusk till Dawn, so I wanted to give it another chance.

I think I liked it this go-around more than all the previous viewings. The first half does feel like Tarantino-lite. This was early in his career. He was paid to write this film in 1992 on commission. They say Tarantino took the best parts of this script and put them into Pulp Fiction. I don’t know if that’s true or not, but this is definitely not his best work.

The Gecko Brothers, Richie and Seth (George Clooney) are on the run after a daring escape from the courthouse where Seth was in custody. They’ve killed several people, including two cops, and have a hostage in the trunk of their car.

They stop at a hotel in El Paso, to plot how they are going to cross the (heavily guarded) border and into Mexico, where someone Seth knows will hide them until things cool down.

When Seth steps out to get a better view of what they are up against, Richie rapes and murders the hostage. Seth is a criminal who will not hesitate to kill someone when he deems it necessary, but Richie is a psychopath.

Salvation (or damnation, as we’ll soon find out) comes in the form of a loving family and an RV. Jacob Fuller (Harvey Keitel) is a former Baptist minister who lost his faith when his wife died in a car accident. He’s taking his two kids, Kate and Scott (Ernest Liu) to Mexico as a getaway from their grief.

There are some nicely tense scenes with the Gecko brothers forcing the Fuller family to drive them across the border and not get caught. Then they head to a skeevy biker/trucker bar called the Titty Twister. It is open from Dusk to Dawn and is the seemingly perfect place for them to hide out until the man can come and give the brothers safe passage.

After some minor confrontations and a pretty darn sexy dance, the vampires come. Things get wild and blood-soaked from there. Tom Savini plays a biker named Sex Machine. It doesn’t seem that he did any of the special effects/makeup work, but this is the type of thing he became famous for doing. There are lots of great practical effects. The vampires have grotesque faces, and they turn to slop when staked and sometimes explode.

It can be a bit much.

When this came out, I thought Quentin Tarantino was the bee’s knees. I saw Pulp Fiction in the theater and thought it was amazing. We watched Reservoir Dogs in the dorm room and went nuts. I also very much liked Robert Rodriguez (who directs this film; Tarantino just wrote it.) I thought Desperado was a lot of fun, and El Mariachi was brilliant for a no-budget film from a first-time director.

But I’ve since very much cooled on Tarantino. I think he is a very talented director but kind of an obnoxious human. I always watch his films and often enjoy them, but the days of them being an event for me are over. The days of me having to see them in the theater are long gone. I now think Rodriguez is a hack.

This feels like the best and worst of what a collaboration between Rodriguez and Tarantino could be. There is some clever writing from Tarantino (and I find it hilarious that he wrote his character as a foot-loving, psychopathic pervert), but it’s also sloppy and disjointed. Rodriguez is at his best when he’s able to let go and just have fun with all the vampire carnage. He doesn’t do nearly as well when he’s dealing with Tarantino’s more dialogue-heavy front end. The two are very good friends, and they seem to let each other indulge in some of their worst instincts. For example, Rodriguez once again uses a crotch gun, and Tarantino gets a scene where he literally sucks beer off of Salma Hayek’s toes.

This definitely falls into the category of movie where you just have to let go and enjoy the ride. I definitely did this time around.

I know this barely qualifies as a western. It takes place in modern times and no one wears a cowboy hat or rides a horse. But it is set in the barren landscapes of Texas and Mexico and its characters would certainly fit into the lawless wild west. So I’m counting it.

New Year, New You: Alice Doesn’t Live Here Anymore (1974)

alice doesn't live here anymore poster

Well, once again I seem to have completely biffed on a monthly movie theme. I really should only choose genres and time periods. Everything else seems to be too much work. I can easily choose movies from a genre on any streaming service or my own collection. Ditto for movies by decade. But when I choose something like this – movies that feature characters in transition or moving in some manner – then I have to do a little research, and then I have to figure out how to watch those films. Most days I’m too tired to do even that little bit of effort.

So here we are on January 24, and I’m talking about my second film from this month’s theme.

Alice Doesn’t Live Here Anymore was Martin Scorsese’s fourth feature-length film. He was still trying to find his footing as a director. His first film, Who’s That Knocking On My Door, is actually quite interesting and dives right into many of the themes Scorsese would continue to tackle for the rest of his career, but it was really just one step above a student film.

After that he moved to Hollywood, and Roger Corman gave him the money (with stipulations) to make Boxcar Bertha. It isn’t a bad film, but it was definitely a director-for-hire kind of gig. Scorsese’s friends, especially John Cassavetes, hated it and were afraid Scorsese was selling out.

He then made Mean Streets, a semi-autobiographical film about street hoods in New York City. It did quite well both commercially and critically and hailed Scorsese as a director one should keep their eye on.

The question then was, what would he do next? The answer came from Ellen Burstyn. She was looking to make what they used to call a “Woman’s Picture” but with more modern sensibilities. Her friend Francis Ford Coppola told her to watch Mean Streets, and she immediately thought Scorsese was the man to make her film.

The movie immediately announces she was right. The opening credits roll over soft satin; an old romantic song croons on the soundtrack. Then we open on a farm straight out of The Wizard of Oz. Scorsese drenches it in bright reds as if the sun is setting. It looks very much like an old film from the classic days of Hollywood. Everything is beautiful, but artificial.

A young girl, Alice (Mia Bendixsen), sings the song we just heard over the credits. She says something about how she’ll grow up to be a singer, and then something like, “I hope to Christ I will.” It is that “Christ” that catches your attention. Little girls in old movies don’t blaspheme. A moment later she’ll curse again. Then she’ll be called into her house for supper. The film moves in on her through the window.

Then crash cut. “All the Way From Memphis” by Mott the Hoople blasts on the radio. The color returns to normal. We see Ellen, now an adult (and played by Ellen Burstyn), in the kitchen of her new home. Her preteen son Tommy (Alfred Lutter) lies on the floor listening to that song loudly, the speakers set inches away from his ears. Ellen is enjoying it. She sways to the music, but her husband, Billy (Donald Hyatt) isn’t so chill. He shouts at Tommy to turn that racket down.

This is Scorsese announcing that this isn’t your mothers type of movie.

I’d seen this film once before many years ago. In my memory, Billy was a horrible husband, mean and abusive. Alice sets out on her adventure by leaving him. I was pretty sure she left her son with him.

In reality, the husband isn’t so bad. He’s not particularly attentive, but other than some yelling, he isn’t abusive. He seems like a man who has become tired of his life – of his low paying job, of his son, who is rather high-strung and is always making noise, and of his wife, who isn’t quite as exciting as she once was. There is an early scene where he lies on the bed watching TV. Alice comes in and asks what he’s watching and what it’s about. He mostly grunts, giving her half answers. He’s not really paying attention to the show, but wants to be left alone. She begins to quietly sob. But he notices her, sees her pain, and comforts her. There is love in that relationship.

Then he dies. A terrible car accident changes Alice’s and Tommy’s lives forever. Alice moved to New Mexico when they got married, but now she’s thinking of that old farm in Monterey, California. She was happy there. She thinks she could be happy there again.

She sells all her stuff and takes to the road. But there isn’t enough money to get them to Monterey. They stop in Phoenix. She gets a job as a lounge singer. She meets a guy (Harvey Keitel). At first she pushes him away, but she’s lonesome, and she lets him have her. He seems nice, and she thinks about staying. Then his wife shows up, and he loses his temper, and they hit the road once again.

They make it to Tucson, and she’s forced to take a job as a waitress at a crummy diner. She befriends Flo (Diane Ladd), a fiery waitress with a way with words (and yes, this part of the movie is the basis for the long-running television series, Alice). She meets another man, David (Kris Kristofferson), and once again her plans for Monterey get sidetracked.

It does feel like a film that was taking something old and outdated and giving it a modern spin. Alice wasn’t exactly unhappy in her life as a homemaker, but she wasn’t thriving either. Her husband’s death forces her to make changes, but this isn’t a film where everything comes up roses. She struggles. She gets sidetracked.

Tommy is a good kid, but he’s loud, obnoxious, and he talks back constantly. Alice mostly lets him get away with it. She gives him sass right back. Sometimes she yells at him, but she’s also very protective of him. This gets her into trouble with her men. David tells her she spoils the kid, that what he needs is a good swift kick in the rear. But she won’t have any of that. It is a very real picture of single-motherhood with all its struggles. Alice isn’t perfect, but she’s trying.

Other than that opening scene, Scorsese refrains from making it too flashy. He lets the story (and Burstyn’s performance, for which she won an Oscar) take the lead. It isn’t my favorite Scorsese picture by a long shot, and it feels very much apart from pretty much every other film he’s directed, but it is still quite good and I recommend it.

The Duellists (1977)

the duellists poster

For a while now I’ve had this idea of creating a list of my favorite films from every year that I’ve been alive. I was born in 1976 so I’d start there and then move forward. I’ve never actually gotten around to it because I figure I need to make sure I’ve seen all of the “classic” movies from each of those years. I don’t want to talk about my favorite films from say 1982 and have somebody chastise me for having never seen Fanny & Alexander or whatever. From there I figure I need to designate a month to each year and watch as many films from that year in that month and then I can really tackle that project. Then I realize I’m 47 years old and it will take me a few years to do that and I just give up.

The other day I randomly watched The Cassandra Crossing which was made in 1976, the year I was born. A new idea was born in my mind. What if I watched one film from every year that I’ve been alive, and do it in chronological order? That seems fun. The only rule would be it has to be a movie I’ve never seen before. And so here we are.

The Duellists is one of those films that’s been on my list to see for a very long time. It was Ridley Scott’s first film and while he is not by any means my favorite director, when he’s good he’s really good and I’d heard this one was really good. I heard correctly.

Based on a Joseph Conrad short story The Duellists focuses on two French soldiers during the Napoleonic Wars. It begins with Lieutenant Gabriel Feraud (Harvey Keitel) dueling with a young man, whom he promptly skewers with his sword. Turns out the young man was the son of the mayor of Strasbourg which puts Feraud into hot water. The higher-ups send Lieutenant Armand d’Hubert (Keith Carradine) to put Feraud under house arrest. He’s having none of that and immediately challenges Armand to a duel. Armand initially thinks the whole idea is ridiculous, dueling with a man he has been sent to arrest for dulling, but Feraud is relentless and the two eventually do duel. The fight ends when Armand knocks Feraud unconscious and is then clawed in the face by his mistress.

A few months later they duel once again and Armand is seriously wounded. Over the next decade, they duel several more times. It is never made clear why Feraud insists on dueling Armand every time they meet. For his part, Armand wants no part of it, but he is duty-bound. If Feraud claims some offense and demands a duel, then he must agree. They cannot duel if Armand outranks Feraud, nor if France is engaged in war. Luckily for Armand, Napoleon is in charge, and Napoleon is always at war.

The film never lets us know if there was an offense to begin with. It sometimes hints that it might have been over a woman, or perhaps Feraud thinks Armand is not loyal enough to Napoleon. But it doesn’t really latch onto either of these ideas. Maybe Feraud hates Armand for some imagined slight. Or perhaps he just likes to duel. The film mostly follows Armand, only letting us see Feraund during the duels, so maybe he spends all of his free time dueling as many people as he can.

The film was influenced by Barry Lyndon (1975) the only Stanley Kubrick film I have yet to watch. The cinematography is lush and beautiful. Keith Carradine is one of those actors whose name always rings a bell, but I can never remember who is he or what he’s starred in. Until I see his face and hear his voice, then I remember how good he is in everything. He’s terrific here. He is a man who wants a simple life, and mostly finds it, but that life is constantly interrupted by Feraud and his demands for duels. When he sees Feraud in a cafe, Armand promptly leaves. He doesn’t want to fight. Yet he always does because he feels honor bound.

The movie is all about honor and duty and how those are often foolish and futile things. Feraud wants to kill Armand over some perceived slight that is so minuscule Armand doesn’t even know what it is. Armand is willing to die (or to kill) to uphold his honor. One could easily expand these thoughts broadly into the futility and foolishness of war between nations. The movie doesn’t get bogged down into these high-minded ideas. It keeps things grounded.

It is amazing to think this was Ridley Scott’s first film. It is an ambitious film for any filmmaker and for it to be his first time as a director it is rather stupendous. That he followed this with Alien(1979) and then Blade Runner (1982) is astounding. Sadly, the rest of his career has not always been so monumental, but for those three films alone he may stand tall.