In this third part of his Mexico Trilogy after El Mariachi (1992) and Desperado (1995), Mexican modern-day outlaw El Mariachi (Antonio Banderas) is recruited by the CIA's Sheldon Sands (Johnny Depp) to kill Mexican drug lord Armando Barillo (Willem Dafoe), who is plotting a coup d'etat against the Mexican President (Pedro Armendariz, Jr.). Simultaneously, El Mariachi takes a quest of revenge against Emiliano Marquez (Gerardo Vigil), a corrupt general who murdered his wife Carolina (Salma Hayek) and their daughter years earlier. Thrown into the mix are several other Rodriqguez regulars like Danny Trejo and Ruben Blades as characters whose connections to El Mariachi, Barillo and Marquez eventually and secretively come to the fore.
Now, I haven't actually seen this movie's two predecessors but despite that I had no trouble following it and even less trouble having fun with it. If you've seen Sin City (2005), The Faculty (1998) or even his Spy Kids trilogy (2001-2003), you'd know Rodriquez is an unashamedly maverick filmmaker with a very slam-bang aesthetic and narrative approach. He has made some missteps, namely the Spy Kids sequels, but here we have him at his ferociously rollicking best. Alongside writing and directing, Rodriguez shot, edited and even scored this one as he often does, and the gleeful energy and consistent attention to detail he subsequently invests into it should wrap a persistent grin on every action or Western fan's face, as it does on mine.
Here you'll also find some genuinely witty, nuanced dialogue like "Are you a Mexi-CAN, or a Mexi-CAN'T?" Rodriguez as well invokes well-chosen locations and imagery to offer, underneath all the blood-soaked action, raunchiness and swearing, an honest but affectionate image of contemporary Mexico. And then there's an unforgettably slick scene involving a guitar case and a staircase. Once Upon a Time in Mexico is convoluted, relentless, dynamic and all around just a literally explosively good time.
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