This Is One Crazy Movie

Rating: 3/10 (4 July 2011)

Extremely violent, very bloody, often crude and at times humorous. That about sums this movie up - except that you'd have to add to the list that it's really quite bizarre as well. The first half or so - while violent and bloody - comes across as pretty straight. George Clooney and Quentin Tarantino play bank robber brothers who are trying to escape from the United States into Mexico after pulling off a job. Much violence ensues, until the brothers finally take an entire family hostage (played by Harvey Keitel, Juliette Lewis and Ernest Liu) and manage to get across the border into Mexico in the family's RV and then proceed with their hostages to an out of the way bar to meet up with their Mexican contact. This, of course, is where things turn truly weird.
It turns out the everyone who works at the bar (the bartenders, the band, the strippers, etc.) are actually vampires - and quite bloodthirsty ones at that. What started as just a place to hang out until they meet up with their contact Carlos becomes an all night bloodbath as they do battle against these creatures and struggle to stay alive.
The first half was actually pretty good, but for me the second half ruined it. This might have worked well as just the story of a couple of violent and perhaps insane bank robbers who try to escape from the law. The vampire thing (even though that's how the movie is sold) was completely overdone and to me at least became very tiresome after a while. How many times do we have to watch a vampire getting a stake through the heart or burned with holy water? Well, according to this movie, we have to watch it a lot! Although I usually like vampire themed movies this one was just too weird to really be of much appeal to me, although it might appeal to action-oriented teens.
I will add a word about George Clooney. I generally don't care much for his movies. It's seemed to me that the bigger he's become in Hollywood the less passion he's putting into his work, most of which I would say is characterized by a total lack of energy or enthusiasm. This was different. I liked him in this role - perhaps because this was still while he was a TV star trying to become a movie star, he put more into it. Whatever it was, this may have been the best performance I've seen him give in a movie. Unfortunately, it had to happen in a movie I didn't care much for. (3/10)