Machete Review

Even though it's September, it's still fairly warm outside right now and thus I still consider it Summer.  And to me, the Summer movie season is officially over.  Why?  Because, I just saw Machete and I don't really have anything to look forward to until Jackass 3D in October (I think) and Tron: Legacy in the Winter, that's why.  So was Machete end Summer with a bang or with a whimper?  Read on to find out!

In a word: Yes.  Machete was a suitable movie to end the Summer Movie Season with.  I don't really know how much I can talk about it because, much like a lot of the movies I've seen this year, you can tell quite well what you're going to be in for just from the trailer and/or the film's description.  And if you're even somewhat familiar with the work of Robert Rodriguez, it just makes it that much easier to decide whether you want to see it or not.  Save for the Spy Kids series or Shark Boy and Lava Girl (none of which I've seen), you know you're going to be in for copious amounts of gratuitous violence and racial stereotypes aplenty.  Machete just cranks everything up to 11.  While I don't consider this Rodriguez's finest movie (personally I prefer From Dusk Till Dawn or Desperado), it is quite the fun movie-going experience.  If you liked Planet Terror, you'll love Machete.  Hell, when I was done watching it, I was hoping for some fake trailers and another movie, Grindhouse-style.  In my Piranha 3D review, I presumed that it would make a great double-feature with Machete and I was right.  Now if we could only get Werewolf Women of the S.S. starring Nicolas Cage as Fu Manchu going...

Anyway, I'm not going to go too in-depth into the story.  Basically you just have Danny Fucking Trejo Esq. chopping off people's appendages with his trusty namesake weapon and getting stuck in the middle of a race war.  Yeah, the plot addresses such sensitive issues as immigration, racism and terrorism, but does so with about the subtlety of a cinder block to the gonads...which works in the context of this movie.  Machete has a lot of enemies to go up against.  Robert De Niro is pretty great as the racist Dubya-esque Senator McLaughlin, whose anti-immigration campaign ads look more like monster truck rally ads.  Don Johnson steals whatever scenes he's in as the leader of a vigilante border patrol group and reminded me a lot of Mickey Rourke in his performance.  Hopefully he enjoys a similar career resurgence.  Even Steven Seagal, who hasn't really done much anything worth remembering in recent years, except a reality show and an energy drink, is fun as Machete's nemesis Torrez.  Paunchy as ever and with a crappy Mexican accent, you still find yourself more laughing with Seagal than at him.  But the true bad guy honors go to Jeff Fahey as Sen. McLaughlin's right hand man Booth, who orchestrates the whole setup.  Fahey evokes a true feeling of being a smarmy dickbag heel found in movies of this type from the '70s and '80s and steals the show.  All in all, most of the acting choices worked.

...MOST of the acting choices.  Lindsay Lohan's inclusion in this movie is mind-boggling to say the least as she basically plays...wait for it...a drugged up early-20's debutante.  I know, right?  That's what I call range!  Seriously, I think the role would have worked if she had cleaned herself up then taken this role as a nod to her past.  But now, she's basically playing herself.  And not that she had major acting chops to begin with, but Lohan's acting comes off unnatural to say the least, which is odd considering the role itself.  Also, I still can't get over Jessica Alba.  Throughout most of the film, I could buy her as a female lead.  Maybe not a hard-ass immigrations officer but she held her own decently enough.  But when she stood up on a car and held a rallying speech that ended with "We didn't cross the border, the border crossed us!", I just wanted to stand up, point and say "Awwww, she thinks she can act tough!"  Whenever she tries to display emotions other than "being hot", she comes off as a 5 year old playacting.  Trust me, this isn't Honey where she can get away with donning some workout gear, shaking her ass and letting me watch with the sound turned off because yes, I am that lonely shutupfuckyou!

And while it may be nitpicking at this point, some of the violence didn't sit well with me either.  Don't get me wrong, I loved what Rodriguez has come up with but somewhere around the Spy Kids movies, he decided to do all the special effects himself.  Normally, I'd give him props for having such a hands-on approach to his movies and refusing to hand them over to someone else.  But I couldn't get over how fake some of the kills looked.  You guys should know my stance on gore effects by now: Practical always beats CGI.  But to be honest, I think it kinda worked a bit better in Machete than it did in Planet Terror.  In PT, with the Grindhouse feel  and the scratched film effects and all, overtly cartoony CGI gore didn't fit in with the whole Grindhouse vibe.  But since there isn't much of a Grindhouse vibe with Machete beyond the opening sequence and closing credits, I guess it can get away with being a bit cartoony.  Once again, this is just one dork's opinion.

Oh, and speaking of violence, Cheech Marin gets crucified.  I'm serious.  Jeff Fahey and Tom Savini (now why didn't he do the special effects?) literally nail Cheech to a cross in a church.  I was really taken aback by it, not because I'm religious by any means, but because I didn't even know it was going to happen.  Normally, I don't really care about spoilers so I'm willing to go into a movie knowing more than I should (which is probably why I loved Inglourious Basterds so much compared to everyone else) but I didn't hear anything about this.  Even moreso, this is the sort of thing that religious groups get up in arms about and protest and ban people from seeing.  And I didn't hear one peep.  So I wasn't offended that it happened, just shocked that people let it slide.  But yeah, if religious iconography gets you up in arms, then I imagine you might not enjoy the movie as much.  But then again, if religious iconography gets you up in arms, then I'd imagine seeing those same arms getting chopped off repeatedly over the course of 90 minutes or so would offend you too.  So obviously this isn't your kind of movie.

But all in all, Machete was a blast to watch.  It's not going to win any Best of the Year honors but I don't think anyone expects it to either.  If you're a fan of exploitation flicks, Mexicans or just plain dismemberment, then Machete doesn't disappoint.

Before I go, I'd just like to ask a question.  I've been toying with the idea of doing audio podcasts on the blog, much like the ones my friends and I do for the gaming sessions at the V1km blog (link now up in the sidebar).  One of my buddies also runs a movie-based podcast called Clash of the Queues (also linked in the sidebar) and I was offered to join in at one point.  But when I listened, it wasn't really my kind of thing at all.  Basically, they were taking discussions seriously, which I never do.  So I'm thinking if I do a podcast, it may be movie-based but focusing on crappy movies.  And I'm not sure if I'd be doing it myself, hopefully I can get some of the V1kM crew in on it.  I'm open to any ideas so post them in the comments and/or vote in the poll so that I can gauge if people are actually going to listen.  Thanks!