- Joined
- Jan 2, 2007
- Messages
- 1,067
Like most people, I loves me some Robert Rodriguez and Quentin Tarantinto. They're both great on their own (Well.. except for when Robert does a kids film) but putting them together has shown some pretty tasty results. So a lot of people seem stumped when I've told them I've never seen this movie. I'm sure I'm going to get lot of crap for this, because I know he has some pretty big fans and he has been in several good movies, but the main reason is because I actually don't like George Clooney. Can't say why, he just bothers me. Plus he starred in that remake of "Solaris." Ick. Well, I finally decided to give this one a watch.
The film, to be honest, wasn't really what I expected. Not to say I didn't enjoy it, but honestly the film was extremely uneven and it felt somewhat unfinished. It felt like there were two scripts here for two different movies, and while reading them Quentin and Robert just cut the bottom half of one, cut the top off the other, and hastily stitched the two scripts together without much care. The first half of the film was rather intense and to be honest, quite disturbing. Tarantino's character scared the living hell out of me, and there's a scene where he rapes and murders a woman, and while its not shown in graphic detail (thankfully) when his brother discovers the body they flash images subconsciously, and while I can normally handle gore and violence it honestly made me a little sick. Yet this all comes to a halt when they head into Mexico with a captive family, and end up at a strip bar. This is when the film suddenly decides that its a black comedy. The tone and plot shifts so quickly, I think the film gave me whiplash. Suddenly we have a sexy dance from Salma Hayek, black humour, Tom Savini (Yay!) and green blooded 'vampires.' I had to stop a film for a second wondering, "What?" The first part of the film was ready to make me list this as one of the few movies to truly bother the hell out of me, yet the second half was suddenly a Braindead-esque comedy gore fest.
While this part of the film was certainly more entertaining, its really sloppy filmmaking to suddenly switch. It even somehow expects you to care about George Clooney and Quentin Tarantino's characters, despite the crimes they committed in the first act. It's pretty damn hard to make one care about two characters that have been shown killing several people, and in Quentin's case, raping them as well. In all fairness, Tarantino's character vanishes amidst the bloodshed, and after awhile Clooney's character does do enough cool things that you kinda forget the fact that you're supposed to be rooting against him, although it was still hard for me to accept that they tack on a romance between him and one of the people he kidnapped. My favourite character was by far Tom Savini's character, but that's a given. You just don't get much cooler than Savini, and he has a special... erm, "Tool" that gave Chie & I some chuckles while at the same time further cementing him as a total badass. I'm assuming he did the gore effects as well, it would be hard to accept Tom Savini appearing in a gorror movie without actually doing the gore.
I won't lie, I'm a little disappointed with the film. After hearing lots of people rave about how great it was, I expected something a little more solid and not so disjointed. Bifurcating two scripts and melding them together usually doesn't work, especially not when one is a disturbing crime saga and the other is a gory dark comedy. It's also a little disappointing because if they had just made two movies, it would've worked better and the plot would've made more sense. It makes you wonder how the first half of the film REALLY ended, and how the second half of the film REALLY began. There are some noticeable plot holes, particularly at the end of the film when they try and tie up the loose ends of the first half, just as sloppily as the film transitioned.
7.2/10
The film, to be honest, wasn't really what I expected. Not to say I didn't enjoy it, but honestly the film was extremely uneven and it felt somewhat unfinished. It felt like there were two scripts here for two different movies, and while reading them Quentin and Robert just cut the bottom half of one, cut the top off the other, and hastily stitched the two scripts together without much care. The first half of the film was rather intense and to be honest, quite disturbing. Tarantino's character scared the living hell out of me, and there's a scene where he rapes and murders a woman, and while its not shown in graphic detail (thankfully) when his brother discovers the body they flash images subconsciously, and while I can normally handle gore and violence it honestly made me a little sick. Yet this all comes to a halt when they head into Mexico with a captive family, and end up at a strip bar. This is when the film suddenly decides that its a black comedy. The tone and plot shifts so quickly, I think the film gave me whiplash. Suddenly we have a sexy dance from Salma Hayek, black humour, Tom Savini (Yay!) and green blooded 'vampires.' I had to stop a film for a second wondering, "What?" The first part of the film was ready to make me list this as one of the few movies to truly bother the hell out of me, yet the second half was suddenly a Braindead-esque comedy gore fest.
While this part of the film was certainly more entertaining, its really sloppy filmmaking to suddenly switch. It even somehow expects you to care about George Clooney and Quentin Tarantino's characters, despite the crimes they committed in the first act. It's pretty damn hard to make one care about two characters that have been shown killing several people, and in Quentin's case, raping them as well. In all fairness, Tarantino's character vanishes amidst the bloodshed, and after awhile Clooney's character does do enough cool things that you kinda forget the fact that you're supposed to be rooting against him, although it was still hard for me to accept that they tack on a romance between him and one of the people he kidnapped. My favourite character was by far Tom Savini's character, but that's a given. You just don't get much cooler than Savini, and he has a special... erm, "Tool" that gave Chie & I some chuckles while at the same time further cementing him as a total badass. I'm assuming he did the gore effects as well, it would be hard to accept Tom Savini appearing in a gorror movie without actually doing the gore.
I won't lie, I'm a little disappointed with the film. After hearing lots of people rave about how great it was, I expected something a little more solid and not so disjointed. Bifurcating two scripts and melding them together usually doesn't work, especially not when one is a disturbing crime saga and the other is a gory dark comedy. It's also a little disappointing because if they had just made two movies, it would've worked better and the plot would've made more sense. It makes you wonder how the first half of the film REALLY ended, and how the second half of the film REALLY began. There are some noticeable plot holes, particularly at the end of the film when they try and tie up the loose ends of the first half, just as sloppily as the film transitioned.
7.2/10
