Director
Robert Rodriguez

Cast
Carlos Gallardo,
Consuelo Gomez,
Peter Marquardt

Music
Los Lobos
(and others)

Director
Robert Rodriguez

Cast
Antonio Banderas,
Salma Hayek,
Joaquim De Almedia

Music
Los Lobos

El Mariachi
I've always been a fan of low budget film making, a few years ago I stumbled across a foreign...subtitled movie called El Mariachi.  Made for a disgustingly low $US7000 , I just had to suss it out, and the result was a real gem of a movie.   Having no budget, the cast and crew members were one in the same, the stunt doubles were reclothed and reused many times over.  Shot on Super 16 film, Columbia came across this movie, had it re-edited and blown up to 35mm for a USA theatrical release.

A stranger(Carlos Gallardo), a Mariachi (guitar playing singer), comes into a small Mexican town carrying a large guitar case, unfortunately for him, a hitman has just escaped from prison, taking with him his own large suit case, which contains his weaponry.  A drug dealer named Moco (Peter Marquardt) wants the hitman dead as he knows he's escapes just to kill him, so Moco puts a hit out on the hitman, with the description being a Mexican carrying a large guitar case. 
So of course the Mariachi is mistaken for the Hitman and his life is put in danger.   Stumbling into a bar run by Domino (Consuelo Gomez), the Mariachi falls in love with her.  Problem is she soon falls in love with him, but she is Moco's girl, or so Moco thinks. 

Robert Rodriguez's feature film debut is an amazing effort, he single handedly wrote, directed, produced, lensed and edited it himself.  All the audio was recorded after the film was shot, as at the time of filming only the image was captured (on film).  Dialogue and most effects where recorded on location shortly after recording the picture to keep it sounding as natural as possible though. 

Desperado
Impressed so much was Columbia with El Mariachi, they gave Robert Rodriguez a budget 1000 times that of El Mariachi (which is actually only $7 million, but it sound far more impressive that way :-)  to shot a sequel, Desperado.  This time around having a  bigger budget, some bigger named stars were sought after and so Antonio Banderas takes on the role of the Mariachi himself.

Following on from the first film, after the death of his girlfriend Domino, the Mariachi is out for revenge, and goes on a killing spree to rid Mexico of all the drug lords with Bucho(Joaquim De Almedia) his nexct target. After his good friend and partner Buscemi (Steve Buscemi) goes to the pub and establishes the story to put some fear into the townsfolk, he is killed by another hitman(Danny Treio)   that has come to town to kill the Mariachi.  However, This hitman is soon killed as he is thought to be the Mariachi.  Our hero saves and then hooks up this time with a love lady Carolina (Salma Hayek) the only bookstore owner in town, after he is wounded.  She looks after him and the two fall in love.  She is also the love interest of Bucho.

Though a follow-up to El Mariachi, Desperado is really a bigger budget remake of El Mariachi, and as impressive and stylish as it looks on film, is just not as good as the first.

So How Do These Transfers Hold Up??

VIDEO
Unfortunately for El Mariachi, the camera negatives have perished and so this transfer was taken from a blown up to 35 mm print. Though this has introduced a fair amount of grain throughout, it's still quite a good clean transfer (this is Columbia afterall).  Framed at 1.77:1 this 16:9 Enhanced transfer is windowboxed to preserve this aspect ratio, The side bars are minimal and depending on your TV's overscan will determine how much of these side bars you actually see...at any rate, they are hardly noticeable.  Though lacking detail, it's really not that bad, remembering this is an ultra low budget movie (it costs 5 times LESS than Blair witch for god's sake :-).   Colour saturation is not that strong but acceptable, and there is no aliasing at all (the lack of detail may have attributed to this)

As for Desperado This was shot on 35mm, and looks fantastic in its 16:9 Enhanced presentation.  The opening scene is a stunner, and pretty much sets the level of this film's look, though on a few occasions the black level seems a bit too intense, and the image did appear soft in places. Colour saturation levels were very good, some a touch high, but never too distracting, AND There was no alaising here either.  Damn this looks good ..Most impressive on a whole

Video Highlights for El Mariachi
Ch 02 09:07 - 09:10 What's in the case?
Ch 03 11:08 - 11:13 A quick drink
Ch 10 29:29 - 29:46 Bar confession
Ch 13 42:51 - 43:13 Mariachi's Debut
Ch 28 75:18 - 75:26 Leaving town

Video Highlights for Desperado
Ch 01 00:28 - 00:49 A Man walks into a bar
Ch 03 11:39 - 12:01 Your only Friend
Ch 05 22:21 - 23:12 Mariachi Lessons
Ch 08 40:18 - 40:22 Operation
Ch 16 56:24 - 56:51 The writing's on the wall
Ch 23 78:49 - 79:01 Gun Slinger

AUDIO
El Mariachi has been released on DVD with 2 languages, the original Latin American/Spanish track, in Dolby 2.0 Surround, and a German Dolby Digital 2.0 Surround.   There is also a Dolby 2.0 commentary recorded and flagged as an English track, so unfortunately the commentary is be default the audio track that my Pioneer player finds and plays back, as opposed to playing the Spanish track by default (it's easy enough to change, but didn't Columbia think of this when they authored this DVD??)
Though not a spectacular sound mix, its okay, and has its moments.  There is a some surround use, and dialogue is clear and quite well in sync (given all the audio was recorded & looped after filmikng), though I have absolutely no idea what they are saying, so the English Subtitles are highly recommended for this film :-)

Desperado on the other hand is encoded with a stunning Dolby Digital 5.1 mix, in English and German (theatrically released in SDDS).  This is an extremely dynamic sound mix with a killer bass attack....Surrounds are constantly alive, and fill the room with ricocheting bullets, explosions and every other conceivable sound effect.  It's a real winner (and yes it will really piss your neighbours off).  You'll be replaying many of it's passages over and over again as you'll be amazed at what they have thrown into the mix.

Audio Highlights for El Mariachi
Ch 05 16:40 - 17:06 Shootout at the bar
Ch 07 22:20 - 22:23 Heads up!!
Ch 13 37:58 - 38:04 Watch were you put that thing
Ch 14 46:55 - 47:20 Day dreaming
Ch 22 63:03 - 63:08 Window shopping

Audio Highlights for Desperado
Ch 02 08:15 - 10:37 Opening credits song
Ch 02 10:40 - 10:58 Solo Clapper (moves around all the speakers...love it!!)
Ch 07 30:23 - 30:29 Ricochet
Ch 07 32:17 - 32:23 Mid air shooting
Ch 12 49:29 - 49:26 Church confession (ambience)
Ch 19 68:54 - 69:12 Rumbling drums
Ch 25 84:43 - 84:47 This limo's a bomb!!

EXTRA FEATURES
Surprisingly El Mariachi is packed with some great extras.  
- Robert Rodriguez has recorded a solo commentary track, that is so informative it'll take two sessions for it all to sink in.  He states at the beginning that he's going to fill the commentary with as much info as possible about making this film and he's absolutely right and It's great listen!!!
- BEDHEAD is his award winning B&W short (pretty funny actually...in a stupid way)
- 10 Minute Film school is a ten minute-ish making of El Mariachi narrated by Rodriguez...very informative
- Also included is a Theatrical Trailer, and Filmographies

Desperado is also packed with some great extras, that are very similar to El Mariachi's 
- Robert Rodriguez has recorded another solo commentary track, that is also so informative it'll take Another two sessions for it all to sink in.  This guy just never stops, though he does add a few timely pauses, and get that remote ready to rewatch a few sequences
- 10 minutes more...Anatomy of a shoot out.. is the ten minute-ish making of Desperado narrated by Rodriguez...also very informative
- Two Music Videos - Morena De Mi Corazon by Los Lobos and Antonio (the song he sings in the opening credits) & Back to the House That Love Built by Tito and Tarantula
- Also included is a Theatrical Trailer, and Filmographies, and the Dolby Digital City Trailer

Considering what is on offer here, this double feature DVD is very much a worthy addition to anyone's DVD collection, PLUS it's retail price is $34.95...for what is   essentially TWO DVDs.  Highly Recommended!!!

Review Equipment
TV: Pioneer SD-T50W1 (16:9 RPTV)
DVD: Pioneer DV717  (using RGB outputs)
Receiver/Decoder: Marantz SR870 & Sony SDP-EP9ES
Speakers:-
     Fronts: B&W 602
     Centre: B&W CDMC-SE
     Rears: Jamo Magic 14
     Subby: M&K V125 

- Reviewed 28th December 1999