6. From Dusk Till Dawn (1997)
From Dusk Till Dawn sounds like a movie pitched by a madman - "So, uh, George Clooney and Quentin Tarantino play two bank robbing brothers who end up on a road trip in Mexico..." - and that's before you've even factored in the fact that it randomly morphs into a fully-fledged exploitation/vampire flick at its mid-point. Why? I'm not sure there's any better reasoning at work here than "Why not?", and that's fine by me. Robert Rodriguez (
Sin City) is behind the camera on this one, but this movie comes beamed straight from Tarantino's brain. So whereas some flicks opt for unexpected tonal shifts,
Dawn goes for a total genre switch-up: the movie begins with Clooney and Tarantino's notorious criminals taking Harvey Keitel and his family hostage in their RV to evade the cops and escape into Mexico, only for - at the hour mark - the whole gang to take refuge in a terrifying biker bar, the ingeniously named
Titty Twister. Turns out this is actually an ancient vampire temple masquerading as a burly hangout, though, and our heroes are launched into an all-out war. A lot of movie-goers weren't pleased with that direction
Dawn took back in 1996, disappointed that such a promisingly,
Pulp Fiction-aligned crime drama appeared to be have been spoiled with some ill-judged silliness. In retrospect, it holds up well. And, hey, at least it's different.