| Plot: Badass El Mariachi (Banderas) returns to finish off General Marquez: killer of his fiancee (Salma Hayek) and daughter. Once he's on Marquez's trail, he's drawn into a deadly standoff between renegade C.I.A. agent Sands (Depp), cartel kingpin Barillo, and a coup d'etat against the president of Mexico by Marquez himself...and Mariachi gives his sawed-off double-barrel shotgun a workout! Review: The last in the El Mariachi/Desperado series, Once Upon a Time in Mexico had a lot going for it right before the first frame of celluloid is even viewed. It has twice the star power, twice the action, and twice the budget of the previous movie "Desperado". Desperado is the second movie I've ever seen to be a remake and sequel at the same time; an honor only shared by Evil Dead 2. Once again the series has changed. The original El Mariachi was gritty and emotional while the action took a backseat to the characters. Desperado was a Hollywood action movie with a violent Pulp Fiction-ish edge. Once Upon a Time in Mexico pumps up the action of the previous movie tenfold and right from the get-go we witness a kick ass action sequence. As a matter of fact, there are a LOT of action sequences where Mariachi and company let the bullets fly in this one. One problem I have with the action sequences is that some of them are a bit cartoonish to where it's obviously a nod to Hong Kong movies. Case-in-point, whenever Mariachi would let loose with the shotgun, sparks would fly off a guy's chest and he'd fly back ten feet. This is all fine and dandy, but it got on my nerves since I was so used to the bloody gunfights in the previous movie. Might just be me, but I wish that they would've dumped the wire stuff and just have a nice, chunky blood splurt. Acting-wise, we have a lot of minor characters that get much of the screen time as opposed to the small list of main characters in Desperado. Willem Dafoe's Barillo just lets the fake mustache and fake tan do all the acting. Nothing wrong with that and he looked like a believable Mexican. There are way too many secondary characters for me to critique, and to be honest, I didn't give a damn about them when compared to Sands (Depp). Johnny Depp once again steals the show with soft-spoken, over-the-top, prosthetic arm-wearing, cook-shooting, corrupt agent Sands. This dude just does not quit with his villain/anti-hero role, which is kind of a shame since Banderas is supposed to be the main character here. Banderas gives us the usual moody and staring at the sky in deep thought looks that you'd expect, but he just isn't as interesting as he was in Desperado even though his vendetta in this one is twice as intense. The only time I was interesting in El Mariachi was when he was blasting away some guy. The story is sprawling in this one and at times I just didn't dig it. Sometimes if you don't listen for that one tiny bit of dialogue, you might be completely in the dark. And even once the movie's done, you still have to piece it together. But to put it simply, it's a giant Mexican standoff between Sands, a drug cartel, the president of Mexico, and General Marquez. The serious tone of the last movies are also dumped as well. Once Upon a Time in Mexico is much more tongue-in-cheek and has a lighter tone (well, as light a tone as a bloodbath can have). Despite the at times bloated story, the movie has all the balls-to-the-wall action sequences and guitar-slinging you've come to expect from the series. If you're looking for a good action movie and if you liked Desperado, you should definitely check out Once Upon a Time in Mexico. |
| Rating: *** |
| Review by Jim |
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