There are very few Hollywood directors right now who do stylized ultra-violence as well as Robert Rodriguez does. He recently upped the ante in a big way with Sin City but you can really see the genesis of what the man is capable of in El Mariachi and Desperado, and while story-wise the final film in the trilogy, Once Upon A Time In Mexico, is a little weak, it's still got plenty of amazing action set pieces and a few stand out performances that definitely make it worth a watch.

Columbia/Tri-Star originally released the first two films on a double feature disc that left something to be desired in terms of quality. They'd later release them on separate DVDs in much improved editions, and eventually give Once Upon A Time In Mexico a special edition release as well. Now they're repackaged the second, better editions of the first two films and tossed them into some slimline keepcases with the third film and wrapped them all up in a nice little box and called it the Mexico Trilogy, dropping the MSRP down and making for a very attractive package for those who don't already have these films. Please note that if you already have the later releases of the first two films and Once Upon A Time In Mexico that you can stop reading now as these discs are exactly the same as those releases and contain the same transfers, the same sound mixes, and the same extra features.

El Mariachi:

Made fast and cheap for amazingly low sum of only $7,000.00, El Mariachi is the movie that made people start paying attention to the young up and coming director. It was shot fast and cheap on 16mm film stock and ended up earning a selection at the Sundance Film Festival which in turn skyrocketed him into Hollywood far faster than anyone could really have imagined.

The movie borrows a little bit from Sergio Leone in that the lead is a mariachi without a name (played by Carlos Gallordo) needs to find a paying gig and as such, he wanders into a town looking for somewhere that he can play. Things start to move when a crime lord named Roco (Peter Marquardt) hears word that his arch-enemy, Azul (Reinol Martinez) has busted out of the big-house and is gunning for him. Unfortunately for the mariachi, he's a dead ringer for the escaped convict who is out for blood, and soon Roco's men are planning a pre-emptive strike on him.

The only person in town who the mariachi even knows is the grungy bartender, Domino (Consuelo Gomez), but there's more to that than he realizes and it won't be long before the mariachi has to put down his guitar and pick up some guns if he wants to make it out of town alive…

There are a few interesting twists in the story along the way but at its heart, El Mariachi is a rather simple tale, but a very effective one. The story of how Rodriguez put all of this together for less than the cost of a good used car has become something of a filmmaking legend (check out the commentary for more details on that) but what matters is that not only did he finish the film but he delivered something special, something worth watching. Originally made for the Spanish speaking market the film was thought to have only limited appeal but the story of the mariachi fighting for his life proved to be a lot more popular than anyone ever initially thought not because of the acting or the story but because of the editing and the action choreography. Rodriguez has a knack for staging shoot outs and fights and even here at a young age in his feature film debut, he shows ability above and beyond a lot of what we see in big budgeted Hollywood productions.

The film isn't a literal masterpiece and it does have it's flaws in the acting department. There are times when the low budget shines through in a few spots but overall, El Mariachi is a pretty amazing accomplishment and one that would set the director up nicely to move on to bigger and better things. Which brings us to…

Desperado:

If Rodriguez was able to turn in a good movie with a seven thousand dollar budget, imagine what he'd be able to do with seven million dollars!

This time out, the mariachi's dirty boots were filled by Antonio Banderas, in one of the best roles of his career. While the film tells a story very similar to that of El Mariachi, it's not quite a remake as it throws a few different twists into the mix. The film again beings with the lone mariachi with no name wanders into town looking for work.

A crime lord named Bucho (Joaquim de Almeida) runs his business out of a bar (where Cheech Marin works behind the counter) and we find out that the mariachi is here looking for him to get revenge. Crime lords don't tend to take that type of thing laying down, however, and when he finds out that the mariachi is here, he wastes no time assembling an army of hit-men to take him down first.

Luckily, or so it would seem, for the mariachi, the beautiful Caroline (Selma Hayek) is willing to hide him in the confines of her small bookstore. With this safe haven, he wages his war against Bucho to exact his revenge, and gets some help from a few friends along the way.

The biggest difference here is that the mariachi character doesn't walk into things by accident this time out. He's a cold blooded killer out for revenge, his guitar case a cache of hidden weapons. With a great supporting cast made up of Steve Buscemi, Cheech Marin, Danny Trejo and Quentin Tarantino, Rodriguez's second voyage into the world of guitar playing gunslingers is a highly polished and incredibly entertaining affair choke full of bloody violence and black humor. Banderas plays the role perfectly, he's suave and slick and just over the top enough to fit the bill, while Hayek brings some very welcome sex appeal to the movie. Their chemistry together works well and is a lot of fun, but the real reason to check this one out is for the action and the gun play.

From the opening scene where Banderas struts across the bar playing his guitar to the grand finale where his mariachi brethren show up to help him out, there's tension in the air of the movie and where there's tension, there's violence. Stealing a page or two from John Woo and another page or two from Sam Peckinpah and Sergio Leone, Rodriguez crafts one of the most enjoyable shoot'em ups of the nineties. Again, it's not all that original and in fact some scenes are down right derivative but it's fast moving and well made and completely enjoyable.

Once Upon A Time In Mexico:

Now firmly established as a top talent in the industry, Rodriguez, after making a few movies in between this one and Desperado, decided to finish the Mariachi films with this last move in the trilogy. Again, the budget had been bumped up, this time to thirty million dollars, and the action set pieces also escalated with it.

Banderas is once more El Mariachi, and this time he's being searched out by an FBI agent named Sands (Johnny Depp) who wants to hire him to kill off General Marquez (Gerardo Vigel) as he knows that he's in cahoots with a drug lord name Barillo (Willem Dafoe). It seems that Marquez and Barillo have got bigger plans than just peddling dope, they're actually involved in planning to take down portions of the Mexican government, and Sands aims to stop that from happening before it's too late.

El Mariachi has a reason to take this job aside from the lucrative paycheck that Sands has dangled in front of his face, as we learn through a flashback sequence that Marquez was the man behind the murder of his wife, Carolina (once again played by Selma Hayek). So with the tempting prospect of revenge proving too hard for him to resist, he assembles his troupe of guitar playing gunmen and sets out to wage war on Marquez and Barillo, but things get complicated when another FBI agent named Ajedrez (Eva Mendes) steps into the picture and a second crime boss named Billy (Mickey Rourke) moves onto the scene.

While Once Upon A Time In Mexico definitely has its moments, it is ultimately bogged down by too many subplots and a truly messy and muddled plot. The basic premise is simple enough, but there are too many distractions from that premise and it ends up hurting the film a bit. That being said, Depp and Banderas are great in the movie, as are Rourke and Defoe. Hayek is pretty much disposable in this one, as despite her prominent role in the ad campaign, her screen time amounts to no more than a few minutes of flashback and as such the sexual tension between Carolina and the mariachi that made Desperado so fun doesn't really come into play here.

The best parts of the film are the action scenes, particularly Depp's last stand, which pays tribute to Fernando Baldi's 1971 underrated Spaghetti Western gem, Blindman. The violence is even more stylized here than it was in the first two movies and everything about the film is as slick and as polished as can be. Rodriguez did most of his own cinematography for the film and the movie does look fantastic as it does a great job of capturing the dust, dirt and grit of the locations in fantastic detail.

Video:

El Mariachi is presented in this set in a pretty decent 1.85.1 anamorphic widescreen transfer. This disc is the second release of the film and as such it has a better transfer than the original version that was first released on DVD a few years ago. Much of the grain that plagued that first release (the double feature disc that paired it with Desperado) has been eliminated as has a lot of the print damage. The colors look very nice on this release and there aren't any serious problems with edge enhancement or mpeg compression artifacts. The film still shows evidence of its low budget 16mm roots, as it should, but the transfer here leaves little to complain about.

Desperado:

Again, this is the improved transfer of the film in this set, not the one from the double feature release. The anamorphic 1.85.1 widescreen image is nice and clean without any serious print damage and only minor grain evident in some scenes. Edge enhancement is kept to a minimum and there aren't any compression artifacts to complain about. There's plenty of detail present in both the foreground and the background of the image and skin tones look nice and natural. Colors look great, black levels are strong and deep, and overall this is a very nice transfer.

Once Upon A Time In Mexico:

It should come as no surprise to find that the most recent film in the set also looks the best. The 1.78.1 anamorphic widescreen transfer is nice and sharp with a lot of detail present in the image, even more so than in the other two films in this set. Colors look bright and bold and very distinct and the black levels stay strong throughout. There's virtually no dirt or debris on the image at all and the compression artifacts are a non issue save for one or two mild instances occurring in some of the darker scenes. Edge enhancement doesn't get in the way, which is nice, and flesh tones look lifelike and natural.