El Mariachi (1992) Review:

It is a surprise to see how far director Rodriguez has come from this movie. This particular movie involves probably the least amount of blood. But either way, it is still entertaining, even if it has English subtitles. I liked the majority of the film except for a few parts.

He did want it to happen....but it did

This movie is the story of the guitar player, El Mariachi, who became the vigilante that he was from Desperado (1995) that Antonio Banderas starred in. Everything is explained. From why he became what he became, and how it happened. This movie is not particularly the jolliest of all films. Neither was Desperado (1995) but it did thread in some humor every now and then that did enlighten the spirits. This movie does have a little of it but the story is more focused on the main character itself.

Carlos Gallardo plays the original Mariachi, as is his original "girl friend", Domino, played by Consuelo Gomez. Both look great together as did Banderas and Hayek did in the sequel. But because the way the story is told, love never develops. Unfortunately, that was one of the things I wish did occur. However, I can't complain because it led up to a nice sequel. Turns out though, the beginning of the Mariachi's story is quite tragic. Like I said before, it explains everything.

Domino, El Mariachi's original love interest

The fact that the actors spoke Spanish throughout the movie didn't bother me at all. I am grateful that there were English subtitles because I could still follow what was happening and what was being said. I also enjoyed listening to the dialog in Spanish. It's not often you run into a foreign film when you're in a English speaking nation. Every Spanish word that I heard sounded sexy and attractive, no matter what mouth it came out of.

The music, which had many composers, sounded alright too. It wasn't as memorable as the soundtrack provided by Los Lobos in Desperado (1995) but it still had a good beat. Something I got confused over were the dream sequences that El Mariachi had. What did they represent? Past events? Was the child a younger version of him? Why the severed head? What did that mean? These nightmares were never addressed and there for left me frustrated because I did not understand the meaning of it.

The introduction of the Mariachi franchise has the same trademarks by Robert Rodriguez but is also much different. Although it's in Spanish, it's still fun to watch and listen, even if the story is tragic.

Points Earned --> 8:10