Robert Rodriguez shares directing credit with some dude named Ethan Maniquis, who has worked with Rodriguez as an editor since "Desperado". I wonder how much of the actual film Mr. Rodriguez actually shot, however. Perhaps the only reason he has a directing credit is because the feature film used essentially all of the footage from the original trailer. Alas, I'm not Facebook friends with Robert Rodriguez, and he continues to ignore my e-mails, so I don't have any answers.
So "Machete" tells the story of sweet Uncle Machete from the "Spy Kids" films, and how he, a Mexican federal agent with a family, lost everything and became an engine of vengeance-fueled destruction. He and a nervous parter are en route to rescue a kidnapped young woman from international drug lord and all-around badass Torrez, but are met with a hail of bullets from a gaggle of henchmen. The nervous partner does not survive this barrage. But of course, Machete does!
He whips out his signature blade, carves up a bunch of people, and finds a naked young woman inside of the safe house. He thinks he's saved the day, but is betrayed when the very naked victim stabs him! He was distracted by the nudity. So with Machete immobilized, she pulls a cell phone out of her vagina (complete with gratuitous squelching sounds) and calls her boss, who is conveniently waiting outside the safe house, and walks right in the instant she hangs up.
So if Torrez was outside the whole time, why did she bother calling him with the cell phone she smuggled inside of her vagina? Oh right, because it's an exploitation film. In retrospect, it's a completely useless moment in a narrative sense, but it got a big reaction from the audience, so it was all worth it.
Oddly enough, Steven Seagal got a bigger reaction from the audience when he walked into the safe house. I think people were just shocked when they realized that Seagal was in a theatrical motion picture. Jesus, he's bloated. I thought he might want to lose a few pounds before he had to shoot this role, but I guess Stephen Seagal told dieting to go fuck itself years ago.
So Seagal (as Torrez) spouts some dialogue in perhaps the worst spanish accent I have ever heard, and then he kills Machete's family. And then he kills Machete. No, he's not really dead. It would be a pretty fucking short movie if our star checked out during the prologue. He's only mostly dead. He gets better, and decides to travel to the USA to toil as a day laborer in Texas. Because what else is he going to do?
If you've seen the original trailer, then you basically know the plot. Machete is hired to kill a Senator, is betrayed by his employer, left for dead, and comes back for revenge. The feature film expands on with the events of the prologue, explaining how Machete, an ex-federale, found himself working as a day laborer/mercenary in the great state of Texas. This also means that we have two big bad guys instead of one.
Or not. You see, Torrez has his sausage fingers in many pies. He says in the prologue that he has members of law enforcement on both sides of the border in his pocket, being such a powerful man. He is also supporting Texas Senator McLaughlin's re-election bid, because his tough stance on immigration will keep the flow of narcotics across the border at a trickle. This will allow Torrez to continue selling his product at a premium.
That's why McLaughlin's henchman Booth (Jeff Fahey) orchestrated the bogus assassination attempt in the first place. When the story breaks that a crazed illegal immigrant tried to kill Senator McLaughlin, his re-election is essentially wrapped up. It's a win-win! Unfortunately for the bad guys, they did, in fact, fuck with the wrong Mexican.
It would be nice if that were the entire story. Nice and neat, right? That's not how it pans out. No, we wouldn't be satisfied with a simple, campy revenge story. We have to throw in a b-plot involving an Immigration & Customs Enforcement agent named Sartana (Jessica Alba), who is out to bust local taco truck vendor and Mexican Underground Railroad conductor Luz (Michelle Rodriguez).
I don't really want to sit here and type out the entire plot to "Machete". Instead, I am going to mention some things I liked about the movie, and some things I didn't like. It's easier, that way.
What Did I Like?
Jeff Fahey
I've liked Jeff Fahey for years. I remember watching a slew of movies on cable as a young lad starring the guy. There was "Parker Kane", "Body Parts", "The Sketch Artist", "The Lawnmower Man", "The Hist List", "The Sketch Artist 2", etc. None of these movies were what you would call "great", or even "good" in some cases. But Jeff Fahey was always good. He just seemed to have this natural charm that drew me in. Of course, I was a young and impressionable child, so I may have just been stupid. But I always liked the guy, and wished that he would break out in Hollywood. Bigger and better things, you know?
But that never really happened. Sure, he's been working steadily for over two decades, but he's hardly ever been in any films of merit. When he was cast in "Lost" a few years ago, I was reminded of two things: that Jeff Fahey was still alive, and that he still had that natural charm that I remembered from my youth.
Gosh, remember "The Lawnmower Man"? I loved that movie when I was a kid. I was the guy who actually saw the sequel in theatres, when it was subtitled "Beyond Cyberspace". I always wondered why they changed the title to "Jobe's War" when it was released on video. I mean, the new subtitle is technically more apt, but I still prefer "Beyond Cyberspace".
That's all inconsequential, because Jeff Fahey wasn't in the sequel. No, he was too smart to agree to star in that mess. Matt Frewer bit that bullet, the poor bastard. Fahey went full retard in "The Lawnmower Man". That was a brave thing. I think he just watched Lon Chaney, Jr. in "Of Mice And Men" over and over to get into character. He even wore the fucking denim overalls. Genius.
I remember finding a VHS copy of the director's cut of "The Lawnmower Man" at a used book store years ago. I was surprised at how much better this version of the film actually was. Over 30 minutes were added to the film, and these extra minutes manage to bring a lot of nuance into the narrative. I know that sounds insane, what I just typed. How the fuck could there be any nuance in a fucking movie like "The Lawnmower Man"? To be fair, the director's cut doesn't make the film a masterpiece by any stretch of the imagination, but it's certainly a better film.
I was always confused by the story of the escaped chimp in the theatrical version. The way it was all cut together, it comes across as a pointless dream sequence. But in the director's cut, we finally get the complete, tragic story of poor Rosco the military chimpanzee. Jobe mistakes Rosco for a comic book superhero named "Cyboman" (give him a break, he's retarded), and tries to hide the chimp from the military. This does not end well for Rosco, and he gets ventilated for his trouble.
It's very sad. After Jobe watches his favorite superhero ever get blasted to the great beyond by a bunch of armed assholes, he breaks down crying. And god dammit, Fahey really sells this shit!
Wait, I'm supposed to be talking about "Machete". So Jeff Fahey is in "Machete". He's great. Then he gets shot by Robert Deniro in a limosine when he realizes that his loyal henchmen orchestrated the fake assassination attempt to curry favor with the voters. That's not so great.
Tom Savini
Everyone's favorite make-up effects guru plays a hit man in the film. A hit man that Booth hires based on his amazing internet audition video. Seriously, that entire video had better be on the DVD. The tiny snippet included in the film is absolutely hilarious.
Savini rolls in with some of goons and descends on Cheech Marin, playing Machete's priest brother. Marin gets a couple of cool moments dispatching a few of the goons with his shotguns before Savini annihilates the reformed stoner's kneecap with an assault rifle. Booth shows up, and the two villains decide to crucify Cheech in the church.
Tom Savini crucifies Cheech Marin. That really happened. Stoner Christ.
After this delightful moment, Booth gets a text from Machete (even though Machete don't text), and realizes that he's coming for them. Savini mentions that Machete is coming for Booth, and not for him. And he decides to do the smartest thing anyone in this movie does, and gets the fuck out of town. Savini survives to crucify another day.
Steven Seagal
I can't believe that Steven Seagal is even in this movie. I thought theatrical motion pictures featuring Seagal were outlawed in the United States five years ago. And the fact that he's playing a bad guy is amazing. I didn't think the man would ever compromise his strong moral code, even in a movie. And he's playing a murdering scumbag drug lord. Pardon me, he's playing a Mexican murdering scumbag drug lord.
He's not a good actor. He's never been a good actor. We all know this. If it's even possible, he's somehow become a worse actor over the years. He's too busy harassing people as a "cop" on "Steven Seagal: Lawman" to remember any of the acting lessons Michael Caine may have taught the man whilst filming "On Deadly Ground".
Seagal doesn't have a huge role in "Machete", but he's the character who looms over the unfolding events, like Harry Lime in "The Third Man". Holy shit, did I just compare Steven Seagal to Orson Welles?
...Anyway, after the prologue, Seagal's role is relegated to irregular faux Skype conversations with Jeff Fahey regarding the progress of their plan to have McLaughlin erect an electrified fence on the US/Mexico border. But Torrez does travel to Texas to have his big showdown with old nemesis Machete in the film's climax.
Torrez brings a katana. Machete whips out the biggest machete on Earth. It's ridiculous, this machete. It's basically a big sword. Our over-the-hill titans clash, and despite the innate hilarity of this pair crossing blades, I was consistently distracted by a pair of extras pretending to duel in the background. These two guys were not really committed to the whole "fighting" thing, and it shows.
This big fight is taking place in the foreground, and I found myself wanting to push the two real actors out of the way to watch the two poorly-paid extras with rubber weapons behind them go at it. No slight to the mediocre fight choreography our main hero and villain were saddled with, I was just so distracted by the two goofs behind them that I became more invested in how their titanic struggle panned out, as opposed to the main fight.
Until Torrez got his own katana slammed through his gut.
With his own sword hilt protruding from his belly, Torrez commences talking shit to his opponent. He shrugs off the wound, telling Machete that he could pull his sword out of his abdomen and kill the guy with it if he so chose. But he decides against this course of action, because it would only mean that Machete would be waiting for him in Hell. So Torrez decides to commit seppuku, dragging his sword across his abdomen, spilling his guts on the black top.
The whole sequence is hilarious. When Seagal grips his sword hilt and spits out the words "fuck it" before he proceeds to empty his vital organs on the dirty ground, I just lost it. I have a feeling that Seagal wrote his own ending for his character, because he refused to have anyone else kill him. He's that kind of guy. If Torrez's suicide is actually in the script, I'll be shocked. Either way, it's fucking great.
Machete Don't Text
Machete mentions earlier in the film that he's not the texting type. So when he finally picks up a cell phone and decides it's time to step into the 21st century, it's funny. To be clear, the only thing that's really funny about this is watching Danny Trejo tapping on the alpha-numeric keypad with his massive, ape-like fingers. Hilarity.
Also priceless is Jeff Fahey's reaction. "I just got a text from Machete." It's the way that Fahey sells the line that kills me, with his wide, unbelieving eyes and throaty whisper. He can't believe that this troglodyte actually texted him. And neither can I.
Michelle Rodriguez
I've never been a huge Michelle Rodriguez fan. She always seems to play the same surly bitch in every movie she's in. Don't get me wrong, she's great at it, but it's starting to feel a little stale. I can't imagine her headlining any romantic comedies, but surely she could stretch herself a little.
That being said, when I saw the first official trailer for "Machete" (not the fake trailer), I was confused. Michelle popped up briefly in the trailer stepping out of the back of ambulance, wearing a leather bra and an eyepatch, with a pair of guns strapped to her hips. She looked hot. I've never seen her look hot before. Was it the eyepatch? Perhaps I have some buried fetish for women wearing eyepatches...
That was all I had to go on, at any rate. She didn't really say anything in the trailer. She was just this one-eyed presence, blasting away at unseen enemies like some kind of modern Amazon. Needless to say, I was already sold. I didn't give a damn if she played the same one-note character in "Machete", as long as she showed up in the third act wearing that get-up, I didn't care.
After seeing the film, I'm pleased to say that Michelle Rodriguez almost played a three-dimensional character in "Machete". Her Luz runs a taco truck that caters to the numerous day laborers in the area. She's a kind, sympathetic soul, who also uses her connections to help her people find a better life in the United States. Her truck is also decorated with propaganda images displaying a shadowy revolutionary called She', a figure who fights the good fight wherever decent people are oppressed.
When she's not butting heads with ICE agent Sartana, she finds herself drawn to the mysterious Machete, and when he asks her about She', Luz admits that the revolutionary warrior is a work of fiction, created as a mere symbol to give the downtrodden a small spark of hope. Rodriguez actually comes across as very sympathetic in this scene. Her character isn't a one-note, tough as nails type; she's just a woman of limited means doing everything she can to help the less fortunate.
It's hardly an Oscar-worthy role; this is a "Mexploitation" flick we're talking about, after all. But Michelle Rodriguez surprised me with her character's occassional moments of warmth.
After Don Johnson and his goons link Machete to Luz, Booth shoots her in the eye, and she apparently dies. Of course, we've seen the trailers, and we know that she returns during the film's climax as a one-eyed avenging angel. I just wish that this plot point had remained out of the trailers. It would have been much more effective if the audience genuinely thought Luz was dead, so that when she climbs out of that ambulance loaded for bear, we could all be pleasantly surprised. It's really a minor thing, though.
It's still a cool moment, because Luz finally takes up the mantle of She', becoming the legendary warrior she had created to inspire others years ago. She' kicks a great deal of ass, and looks hot while she does it. In the end, I was honestly disappointed that the movie didn't focus more on Michelle Rodriguez, because she was a serious highlight.
With any luck, we'll get a spin-off movie featuring She' overthrowing some South American dictator in brutal fashion. I doubt it, though. I'm still waiting for my "Man With No Eyes" spin-off starring Johnny Depp.
What Didn't I Like?
Robert Deniro
To be fair, I didn't always dislike Mr. Deniro in the film. There were moments scattered throughout the movie where Deniro was clearly having a good time playing his minor role as the corrupt, racist Senator McLaughlin. His rather ridiculous good ole' boy accent is proof of that. At times there's a life in his eyes that I haven't seen in years. But there are also times when he just seems bored, like he realized what kind of movie he was in and got depressed.
I did like some of the curveballs the film threw at him. Early in the film, we're shown a sequence involving a group of Minute Men-esque characters patrolling the border, led by Don Johnson (sporting the sharpest, most well-defined sideburns I may have ever seen in a theatrical motion picture). They spot a pair of Mexicans, a man and his pregnant companion, attempting to cross into American soil.
Johnson kills the pregnant woman, because he doesn't want her "anchor baby" born in the USA. An unseen shooter guns down the man, and it's revealed to be Senator McLaughlin, riding along with his militia pals. It's a pretty decent introduction, actually. We learn basically everything we need to know about the guy, right there.
Later on, Johnson and his pals kidnap McLaughlin when they learn that their shooting buddy is in bed with Torrez, forcing him to record a statement identifying himself as a traitor against his country. When the militia compound is besieged by an army of angry immigrants, McLaughlin escapes and is confronted by She', who gives the Senator a choice: die where he stands, or fight with the immigrants he despises.
Obviously McLaughlin, being a man who will do anything to save his own skin, dons a tattered hoodie and ridiculous straw hat and runs around the compound shooting at any white people he sees. This is awesome.
Unfortunately, it doesn't last very long. A little background: Lindsey Lohan plays Booth's drug-addicted daughter in the film. When she learns that McLaughlin has murdered her beloved daddy, she vows revenge. She arrives at the compound dressed like a nun (I don't know why) and shoots McLaughlin. Then she haphazardly fires her gun at a crowd of fighters, miraculously disarming them all. I don't get it, either.
I couldn't believe I saw Lindsey Lohan shoot Robert Deniro.
Luckily, McLaughlin was only playing dead, because he was wearing a bullet-proof vest. So our beloved Senator escapes, living to fight another day. At the end of the film, we see the Senator trekking across the border to Mexico, headed South to put his life back together.
That would have been a great ending to his story, but alas, that's not all. A few of Don Johnson's surviving buddies catch up to the Senator and murder the bastard, just because the movie wanted to have its cake and eat it, too. Lame.
Lindsey Lohan
And what about Lindsey Lohan? She's hardly in the movie, and when she is featured, she doesn't have much to do. She apparently makes money running a pornographic website. She convinces her mother to cavort naked in their swimming pool with her for one of her videos. Machete shows up and gets it on with them both before he drugs and kidnaps them.
But this footage should be familiar to anybody who has seen the original fake trailer, because that's all it is. Remember the shot with Machete in the pool with the two naked chicks? That's what this is. So we have an obvious body double in this sequence who looks nothing like Lindsey Lohan. Were Rodriguez and Maniquis doing this because they didn't think we'd notice? Or was it just another homage to the exploitation films of yore? Either way, it was incredibly distracting.
Machete drops the slutty mother-daughter pair off at the church for Cheech to look after. I'm not sure where they were when Tom Savini and Jeff Fahey were crucifying the guy, however. Sleeping?
Sex Scenes? What Sex Scenes?
So every time Machete is about to bed one lovely lady or another, this stupid generic "porno" music plays and the scene fades out. I hate that. Now, I don't necessarily want to see Danny Trejo's naked, sweating mass pumping away at Michelle Rodriguez, but it's just the idea that we can't actually see any sex scenes in a film like this. It's so bizarre. Michelle Rodriguez waves an egg around Danny Trejo's face, they share some "sexy" banter, then we fade to black. It's fucking weird.
It's the same stupid decision that I hated about "Planet Terror". It's a fucking exploitation movie! At least "Planet Terror" managed to fall back on that cutesy "scene missing" schtick. At least we get to see Jessica Alba standing naked in a shower, her arms and legs strategically placed to avoid revealing anything "inappropriate". Thanks, assholes!
Fuck Jessica Alba
God, she has got to be one of the worst actresses in modern cinema. She has never been good. Never. And I'm not sure why everyone thinks she's so attractive, either. Her face carries the constant expression of an over-medicated mental patient. Except when she tries to play badass, then she looks like a brain-damaged kid playing an overenthusiastic game of "cops n' robbers".
Her character is supposed to be a hardass with a chip on her shoulder for being overlooked for promotion time and time again. There's supposed to be some sort of conflict regarding her job as a Customs officer and her heritage, but the script can't manage to give her anything resembling a character arc. A better actress could still bring some subtext to this role. Jessica Alba is hardly an "actress".
When she finally does her big hero turn in the third act, she climbs atop a car and gives a rousing speech to a cadre of disenfranchised immigrants. At least, I'm sure that's what it said in the script. Jessica Alba just yells a bunch of lines with no hint of conviction and raises her fist. It's pathetic.
And at the end of the film, when Machete is riding off into the night on his motorcycle, he's pulled over by Jessica Alba in a Sheriff's Department cruiser (I don't know why), and she's dressed in a "slutty cop" halloween costume. She climbs on Machete's hawg (heh) and they exit the film together.
Why? There was no sexual chemistry between these two characters, at all. Hell, there was no chemistry, period. Why in the name of Mrs. Wiffle's Frozen Kitchen would Machete choose this untalented statue to be his old lady? It should have been Michelle Rodriguez tooling around America with Machete, not Jessica fucking Alba. At least I could buy a relationship between She' and Machete. I mean, that almost makes sense.
The Big Climax
Overall, the climactic duel between Don Johnson's milita, Torrez's cartel hoodlums, and the army of crazed immigrants falls flat. It starts off promising, with an armada of lowriders prowling the streets, en route to their date with destiny. Machete's crew is ready to fuck shit up. But the battle quickly degenerates into a mess of shoddy fight choreography, digital blood, and missed opportunites.
Remember the big moment that closes the original trailer, with Machete sailing through the air on his chopper, mounted gatling gun blazing? That's in the movie. And that's it. He sails through the air for two seconds, blasts a handful of goons, then it's over. We never see this amazing chopper-mounted personnel destroyer again. We don't even get one random shot of Machete riding around the compound, blasting away at his enemies. It's useless.
And She's big reveal is ultimately disappointing. She has a lot of guns strapped to her. She stands in one place, empties all of her guns, discards them, then the movie cuts to some other pointless fight sequence. There's so much wasted potential in this sequence, it's astounding.
But I do have to give it a few points for the ridiculous factor. Seeing an angry ice cream vendor run into the fray, still pushing his cart filled with delicious frozen treats is a funny sight gag. Watching a bunch of hotel kitchen staff members fighting with pots and pans was amusing. And the Babysitter Twins showing up, raining hell on nobody in particular was worth a laugh.
What Else?
Machete escapes from a hospital by eviscerating one hapless henchman, using his intestinal tract as a rope as he leaps out a 4th floor window. Good times.
In The End...
Despite its flaws, "Machete" really is just a dumb, entertaining movie. I may have a few problems with it, but none of them hampered my enjoyment. I saw it on Labor Day with my cousin Ky, my brother Matt, and his girlfriend Amanda. And we all had a blast. I hope Rodriguez and his new protege, Ethan Maniquis make a sequel.
One suggestion: More Michelle Rodriguez, Less Jessica Alba.
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