Reel Horror

From Dusk Till Dawn 2: Texas Blood Money asin: 6305428468

This film has Quentin Tarantino written all over it. He was the executive producer but it looks like he told the director what to do as well! It has all the trademark Tarantino-isms, camera shots, dialogue and music. Combine that with elements of horror and you have a good formula. His presence behind the scenes is felt more in this installment than in the first one.

The movie stars Robert Patrick, whom most of us know as the T-1000 from Terminator 2. He does a very good job in the leading role as a reluctant criminal persuaded back into crime by a friend who has a bank robbery plan. Patrick's character, Bucky, then proceeds to put together a crew of fellow criminals to go to Mexico with him and meet his friend, Luther. Then they will discuss the plans.

Well, it doesn't all go as planned after Luther's truck has a mishap on his way to meet the rest of the guys. He ran into a very large bat, which turns out to be, you guessed it, a vampire! In turn, Luther gets infected by the curse of the night. He finally meets up with the guys but is now in a hurry to get the bank robbery over with. Now, Bucky seems a little suspicious of his old buddy and for good reason. Luther proceeds to turn the rest of the crew into vampires, unbeknownst to Bucky, but eventually he catches on and wants no part of it. Things get bloody and the cops show up outside of the bank. Bucky ends up teaming with his old enemies, the cops, to take on his new enemies, his friends.

I won't divulge the entire film but it is worth a watch if you liked the first one and John Carpenters Vampires. The supporting cast does a great job as well. Luther being a believable and imposing blood-sucker and the same type of special-effects we got in the first movie give us a good dose of evil here.

The only complaint I have is the length of the film. It's too short to get the full effect of the movie across. While the characters seemed to have just enough time to develop and let us get to know them, the pace of the movie moves along quite swiftly. Makes for a fun ride but missing a little in the end. All in all a good vampire movie in the vein of the first, a worthy sequel considering none of the cast from the first return(with the exception of the bartender), and it was a straight-to-video release. I say watch this movie sometime in your life. Not the best ever but certainly not bad at all!