Machete Kills

Machete Kills (2013)

29% on Rotten Tomatoes (out of 99 reviews)

Runtime: 107 minutes

Directed by: Robert Rodriguez

Starring: Many people, including Danny Trejo, Mel Gibson, Amber Heard, Sofia Vergara, & Carlos Estevez

From: Open Road

I still remember first seeing the fake Machete trailer back in '07 and I thought it looked awesome. I then enjoyed Machete which I saw twice on the big screen (including once at a drive-in with the ultimate perfect partner in Piranha), the review you can read here. As I did have a lot of fun with the first movie, I was hoping it'd be the same with the sequel. The fact that I only saw it last night is telling, though. The pretty bad reviews turned me off, and even before that people were complaining about how there were too many characters in the film; turns out they were right...

The plot, via myself: Things happen in the beginning, and Machete is brought to the White House to meet the President (Charlie Sheen, acting under the name on his birth certificate) and he has to go down to Mexico to try and take down a bad guy who wants to blow up Washington. A lot happens and it ends up being tied to a guy with the Bond-esque name of Luthur Voz (Gibson). In fact, the movie has a surprising amount to do with a certain Bond film that I won't spoil as it would reveal quite a bit.

It won't be until tonight but when I do write up my opinion of it on Letterboxd, I'll likely give it 2 and a half stars out of 5. That seems most appropriate. There are things I enjoyed but then there are other things that I thought were just stupid, being over the top but in a dumb and insulting way. It went up and down like a rollercoaster. It was bipoloar, which is ironic given that... but that's another spoiler. What counts as a stupid thing was how Walton Goggins, Cuba Gooding Jr., Lady Gaga and Antonio Banderas all played the same character, El Camaleon. That was just a waste.

There indeed proved to be way too many characters in this movie. That certainly did not help what was a mess of a script, where things are chaotic in a poor way and that has to be a big reason why it was such a flick with mixed results. The fact that it turns sci-fi is just goofy; they did tease that the third film would be set in space! No kidding. With the box office take of this movie, though... who knows if there will be a third Machete movie.

At least there were still things throughout that I enjoyed so I did not hate the movie; I was just disappointed by it. I did enjoy how there were plenty of good-looking women in the film. Alexa Vega certainly has grown up from her Spy Kids days. She is a very pretty lady now. I would have liked more of that character and have some others deleted. I was hoping this'd be one of the best movies of 2013 in my eyes, but nope. Hopefully by the end of this year I'll have a list that will have 10 viable options to make it look good.

I'll be back tomorrow night.