*** (out of ****)
Starring Antonio Banderas, Johnny Depp, Salma Hayek, Willem Dafoe, Mickey Rourke, Eva Mendes, Ruben Blades, Cheech Marin, Danny Trejo, Enrique Iglesias, Marco Leonardi, Tito Larriva, and Pedro Armendariz
“Shot, chopped, and scored” (directed, written, scored, and edited) by Robert Rodriguez
2003 R
Although I really enjoyed it, “Once Upon a Time in Mexico” is not quite the movie I was hoping to see. I was hoping for a movie with the silliness of “Desperado,” but with a real story upon which to fall back. Not even a profound story, but just something from the school of “Lethal Weapons” and “Die Hards.” “Once Upon a Time” certainly has the illusion of a real story, in which Our Hero El Mariachi (Antonio Banderas) is only one of many pawns in a CIA agent’s (Johnny Depp) masterplan, involving the head of a drug cartel, a former FBI agent, the assassination of El Presidente, a crooked general, and face lifts. The setting for all this intrigue is a small Mexican city (or a large Mexican village) with everything going for it: a giant cathedral, a cluttered marketplace, an arena for bullfighting, sleazy dives everywhere, endless sidewalks and patio cafés, and surrounded by jungle and cacti. But do all these elements add up to anything substantial? Well, they add up to a giant, three-way battle between El Presidente’s men, the crooked general’s soldiers, and, apparently, the Day of the Dead. You heard me. Not just a fight on the Day of the Dead, but with the Day of the Dead.
But what about the question of substance? Maybe director and writer Robert Rodriguez has given us something more precious than another “Lethal Weapon” knock-off. Maybe the answer is in the title itself: “Once Upon a Time in Mexico” is of course reminiscent of the work of Italian director Sergio Leone, who made “Once Upon a Time in America” and “Once Upon a Time in the West.” The son of an opera director, Leone was not as much interested in story and character as he was in bold images, sweeping, unforgiving landscapes, dizzy action sequences, and cool guys in even cooler poses, for whom speech is entirely optional. And that’s the goal of Robert Rodriguez’s “Once Upon a Time in Mexico,” to make giant, sweeping images, to tell portentious dialogue, and to make a big painting about Mexico itself. Or at least a pop culture view of Mexico. The movie is also about cheerfully and fearlessly combining the portentious images with low-brow humor; during a gunbattle in a church we spot a shawl-wrapped old lady calming going through the rosary.
The United States is, in general and regardless of political stripe, a nation of whiners. Nothing is ever good enough for us, and that’s made us what we are. So we are alternately intrigued by and feel superior to more resigned, laidback cultures like movie Mexico. Rodriguez has, as in “Desperado” and “El Mariachi,” painted a surprisingly loving, if romanticized portrait of Mexican peasantry, which appears to have found wisdom in its serenity. In the U.S., morality is equated with anxiety; you’ll see bumper stickers that read “if you’re not worried then you haven’t been paying attention.” South of the border (at least in the movies) means that altar boys will patiently move pews that have been riddled with bullets in a recent gunfight.
Rooting for a country like America or the U.K. doesn’t take much. Mexico may, in comparison, be one of the world’s underdogs. Officials are easily bribed and El Mariachi, the hero of “Once Upon a Time in Mexico,” is initially hired by the CIA to stand by and do nothing when El Presidente is assassinated. But you can only push a Mexican so far, Rodriguez declares, and “Once Upon a Time in Mexico” is bold enough to show El Mariachi locking, loading, and marching into the jaws of death to save El Presidente, “for Mexico.” In true Leone style, the heroes refer to themselves as “sons of Mexico” before blowing away a bad guy. Like Leone, Rodriguez has no need for subtlety, not when El Mariachi is proudly wearing the Mexican flag, and not when El Presidente has symbolically disguised himself as a commoner to survive.
Anyway, to bring everyone up to speed on the “Mariachi” movies, which probably play faster, looser, and more internally inconsistent than any other trilogy in movie history, we begin with “El Mariachi” from 1992. In it, El Mariachi (Carlos Gallardo) is an innocent and naïve guitar player caught in a web of guns and bloodshed, culminating in the death of (not his girlfriend) the woman he loves. In 1995’s “Desperado,” El Mariachi (now played with a limitless supply of bullets and cool by Antonio Banderas) is out to avenge the death of the woman he loves, although we thought he did that already at the end of the first movie. “Desperado’s” Mariachi is at this point a hardened killer, and carries with him so many melodramatic clichés that he is not so much a character as an action movie archetype. He is rogueishly handsome, clad in black, unstoppable. At times he is cool and composed, at others he is drunken with angst, and he’s not much of a talker.
The Mariachi is barely enough character for one movie, let alone an entire trilogy, so in “Once Upon a Time” Rodriguez gives us a CIA agent—at least that’s who he claims to be—played with crazed genius by Johnny Depp. The rumors are true, and he really is the soul of movie. We don’t know which part’s hero, which part’s villain, but he’s all bad-ass. He is everywhere at once, roaming around with long hair, sunglasses, and absurd tee-shirts that say “Cleavage Investigation Agency” or “I’m with stupid” with a picture of a finger pointing at his crotch. While playing all the factions against one another, Depp explains the CIA’s purpose in Latin America as an attempt to maintain and restore balance. Of course his very presence is another pop culture view of Mexico, of course he’s mad, and of course we should expect this kind of terrific goofiness from the star of “Ed Wood,” “Pirates of the Caribbean,” and “Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas.” It takes courage to deliver lines like “are you a Mexi-can, or a Mexi-can’t?” in complete deadpan.
Page two of "Once Upon a Time in Mexico." Back to home.