The Curse of El Charro (2005) User Reviews

A Gore Mess

[claudio_carvalho · 3/10 · 20 July 2008]

In California, Maria (Andrew Mia) has awful nightmares with and visions of her sister that committed suicide one year ago. Her roommate Chris (Heidi Androl) invites Maria to travel with her and her friends Tanya (Kathryn Taylor) and Rose (KellyDawn Malloy) on vacation to her uncle's house in Saguaro, Arizona, to relax. When the group arrives in the house, they immediately go to a night-club to have fun and chase some local guys for sex; however, the evil El Charro (Andrew Bryniarski) is seeking Maria killing her friends with his machete.

The slasher "The Curse of El Charro" is a gore mess. The characters in general are unpleasant and I do not understand how the four girls could take a road trip together: Maria is a deranged woman; Tanya is an amoral slut; Rose is a lesbian drug dealer; only Chris seems to be an average person. The screenplay is awful, and in the beginning, Maria is confessing her nightmares to a priest that seems to know something about her fate. Then, a group of young women from California that seems to be in a permanent heat goes to a desert place in the middle of nowhere to drink booze, use drugs and have sex with hillbilly strangers, in a totally weird and unusual situation. The creepy El Charro kills every character with his machete without any further explanation. The conclusion seems to indicate that the insane Maria actually killed her friends, but it not clear. My vote is three.

Title (Brazil): "A Maldição de el Charro" ("The Curse of El Charro")

One Of The Most Uneven Messes I've Seen

[danthewrestlingmanorigin · 2/10 · 2 January 2007]

El Charro opens up in a fairly interesting way, leading me to believe it was some sort of religious supernatural thriller. However these themes are pushed aside, and not really developed. Later the group of friends run into a creepy Sheriff, who escorts them to bar, filled with assorted weirdos, including a wheel chair bound death metal rocker, suffering from some kind of mental handicap. At this point I'm thinking the film is going to become a Devil's Rejects, or Texas Chainsaw Massacre insane family type of film. No again, they simply leave the bar, and the Sheriff, and his wacky pals are never developed beyond that. Seriously, the writer or somebody has really messed up here, the film is a jumbled mess, and I can't begin to imagine where they went wrong. The film doesn't know what it wants to be, one minute it's going for the intense dramatic angle with a girl coping with the suicide of her sister, the next it features snore inducing stereotypes trying to party, and get laid. Finally by the end, it decides to go the slasher route, but it's far to late. I rate this a two, because I know some of the actors' are better then the material, and there are a couple decent kill scenes in the end, though nothing special. For those of you wondering, there is a brief lesbian shower scene with Tabitha Stevens, but it lasts all of three seconds, and you don't see much of anything. On a side note, Lemmy what were you thinking? You have to stick with Troma man, you were great in Tromeo And Juliet, but this garbage is beneath you.

strange slasher film

[wrlang · 4/10 · 26 November 2006]

The Curse of El Charro is about a girl who sees visions about her sister's suicide. Apparently Charro is punishment for the girl's family for something her ancestors did. It wasn't easily discernible because the film was not that interesting to watch. She goes on a trip with some back stabbing friends, and everyone is attacked by El Charro. Her persistent dreams give away the film. The characters have no redeeming qualities and there is nothing that gives this film any reason to be viewed other than it is there to be watched. Some of the cinematography is interesting, but the film flips around between flashback, Charro, and the star. If you're looking for some mindless slashing, this film is for you.

Please El Charro, either kill them or kill me!!!

[MsHypothetical · 1/10 · 22 March 2005]

Four completely unlikable characters played by four of the worst actresses ever seen, a script that moves along at a pace that would make a snail look like Wilma Rudolph, pointless and goofy religious "symbolism," awful lighting and cinematography... all add up to the biggest waste of time you will ever know. The only reason for sitting through this amateur self-indulgence is the hope that finally, at long last, the screenwriter will have an idea and something will happen (and, hopefully, some of these horrible people will get slaughtered!). We should pray for financial ruin to befall whoever financed this ridiculous twaddle so that these people can never make another film ever again. If you're expecting this to be one of those films that's so awful it's great, no such luck. Just plain awful. Period. But, at this point, the friends and family members of the filmmakers have managed to get the votes up to 8 stars. Don't be fooled; it's only a matter of time before real audiences start wasting their time and money on this catastrophe and registering real votes.

One of the worst ever

[brooks-49 · 1/10 · 1 October 2006]

I have watched some of the worsts wastes of film in my time but this is by far the very worst. Too bad the director and producer weren't among the victims so that we could have been spared this travesty to film making. The movie made absolutely no sense. The sound director didn't appear to know what they were doing. This movie was definitely done on the cheap since the lighting and the sound both were sub-standard, considering that the actors and actresses were all unknowns there should have been more than ample money to hire people to properly do the sound and lighting. The next time that the investors decide to invest in a movie I hope they remember how pitiful this one was and decide against it.

What a waste of time!

[rayfen · 1/10 · 28 January 2007]

I thought that nowadays, with the technology and resources available, it was no longer possible for anyone 'serious' who wants to produce a low cost horror film could possibly come out with a crap... but apparently I was wrong. I thought this movie was worth watching and only after 15 minutes I realized it was a waste of time and believe me, I was tempted to fast forward it. It is certainly one of the worst I've ever seen. It just has nothing right, the script, acting, scenery, effects, its direction, etc,etc are all a disgrace. It is so inexplicably poor and selfish. Of course I've seen worse, perhaps that is the only consolation.

Pathetic Attempt

[RobertCraig67 · 1/10 · 12 December 2006]

Had the filmmakers not tried to introduce a bit of artistic license into the film, I'd simply write it off as a sub-par slasher flick. But the lame effort put forward by this crew gives dilettantes a good name.

The only positive thing one could say about this film is that the production values aren't horrid. That script though...my lord. Would it have hurt the filmmakers (as much as I was by viewing this junk) to invest even an hour thinking of something mildly original. Renting a film like this, I really don't expect much, but I did expect something.

If you're thinking of watching this tripe, do yourself a favor - attack your brain with a fifth of tequila or something similar before settling into this garbage. Must pass...

Among the worst i have ever seen...

[gnagare16 · 1/10 · 30 January 2006]

I just briefly checked the ratings here on IMDb on this movie before i rented it. I thought that it was kind of worth watching so i decided to give it a try. It didn't take very long before i realised that i should have stayed away from this movie. I would say this movie is one of the 10, if not 5, worst movies i have ever seen in my entire life! There is so much bad things i could mention about this movie... the acting, the script, the effects etc... I am sick of all relatives to the group that made this film, who comes here and votes 10 stars and say its a great masterpiece better then Twin Peaks with breaking music. If you can find this movie for sale for 1 cent, then maybe, just maybe i would recommend it for you if you are in need of a DVD-cover. Otherwise my best suggestion is for you to keep as far away from this movie as possible. Discrase that it even got released.

Nothing to see here, folks, move along.

[billsands · 3/10 · 9 July 2008]

Watching this movie is like watching a car crash in reverse. It begins as a blurred, direction-less, and confused mass of visions and concludes with the climax and falling action occurring in a ten minute span. It's an hour and fifteen minutes of sex and drugs, until the director remembers that it's a horror movie and kills almost everyone in a ten minute span. To give a basic plot summary, a group of young women driving through the desert are stalked by a killer "ghost," who is really just a really tall guy in a poncho. The most frustrating thing about this movie is that you don't care for the characters, in any way at all. They aren't likable enough to make you want them to pull through, but aren't annoying enough to pray for a painful death. All except one particularly foul-mouthed girl, who is thankfully given minimal screen time and an extra bloody death, but I digress. Three of our four heroines seem to have double parked outside the studio, as they indulge in sex, drugs, and advanced stupidity as if they want to die as quickly as possible. Our fourth leading lady is plagued by constant violent visions and confusing flashbacks, including a memorable(for all the wrong reasons) flashback which takes the style of a Charlie Chaplin film, but without any humor or quality. Our evil ghost, channeling the spirit of Michael Myers, walks around in pure silence, the only problem being he is TOO slow and it takes an hour for him to get any serious killing in. Since our villain is traveling with all the speed of molasses in January, the director fills in time with enough bong hits to make Cheech and Chong envious. By the time El Charro actually begins his work, it's a good bet that you'll either be asleep or, in my case, toughing it out because you don't like leaving things unfinished. Either way, you won't see much.

Grindhouse movies: alive and well. Sort of.

[M-Ols · 4/10 · 14 July 2008]

Quentin Tarentino and Robert Rodriguez tried (I'd say, with mixed success) to honor the history of grindhouse movies -- low budget movies shot with gonzo velocities and lots of cleavers & cleavage.

What Tarentino and Rodriguez tried to celebrate from their mink-lined, gold-plated director chairs, these guys did all by their loathsome lonesome, and cranked out El Charro. A masterpiece? No - not by a long shot. But, you know, it does have all the hallmarks of grindhouse: barely comprehensible plotting, bizarre riffs from the periphery, cars on desert highways, bad dialog, bad cops, bad bars, some nonsense about curses, babbling priests, buckets of blood, a couple hundred f-bombs, and (duh) topless women.

If you're looking for El Charro to introduce you to next round of cinematic genius, you'll be sorely disappointed. But, if you've been hankering for some drive-in quality, B-movie slasher junk -- then why the hell not?

(The soundtrack kind of kicks a--, by the way).

Frightening AND Funny

[seanmcmahon7 · 10/10 · 27 March 2005]

When Rich (the director & composer) first asked me to orchestrate his score to El Charro he gave me a rough cut of the film. I was amazed to see that a $200,000 could look like a 2 million dollar film. When I saw the polished version at the premiere it looked like an even bigger budget movie. My first reaction was that it was a completely unique horror film. I had never seen a horror film before that incorporated silent film and animation elements. The story is told very succinctly and flows nicely. There are some really nice shots in there too. Even though I had seen the rough cut of the film a couple of times before, all those stingers at the premiere still scared the living daylights out of me. One of the big successes of this movie, I think, is all the humorous moments that were pulled off so well. It got lots of laughs. It was definitely a nice touch. I also thought a nice job was done with the villain's prosthetics. Very creepy. Anyhow, hopefully there'll be a sequel in the works soon!

Entertaining modern slasher

[slayrrr666 · 7/10 · 2 November 2007]

"The Curse of El Charro" is an above-average if still decent slasher.

**SPOILERS**

Following her sister's suicide, Maria, (Drew Mia) and her friends Christina, (Heidi Androl) Rosemary, (KellyDawn Malloy) and Tanya, (Kathryn Taylor) decide to take a trip to Arizona to get her mind off it. As they make their way along, she keeps experiencing weird visions and dreams that the others grow tired of. When they arrive in town, they meet with Levi, (Andres Lopez) King, (Matthew Prater) and James, (Phillip Boyd) as well as friend Elvira, (Tabitha Stevens) and soon return back to a party house once the visions occur again. Once they get back, they realize that they are being stalked by a local legend named El Charro that also has ties to how her sister ended up. Getting notice of the killer, they try to get away before it gets what it wants.

The Good News: Every now and then, this one gets pretty interesting. There's some fun to be had from the really unique angle of the film. There's some really great stuff inside about how unusual the killer is, and that makes for some fun. The inclusion of all the Mexican heritage, which is hardly used and really makes it seem like a mystery as this one is given something rather new. The killer is pretty well-done in here, since there's never a good clear shot until the end, and those are overall pretty good. With the face covered by a large hat, demonic eyes, a hulking figure and a blood-stained poncho, this one has a pretty nice killer to it that works for what is there. What really makes the film, though, is the final act, which is all-around great. This is where most of the kills occur, almost all of the suspense and a lot of great action. The kills here are pretty brutal, with several nice decapitations, a gory slit throat, a knife impaled in the eye, a couple dismemberments and several others who are simply hacked up repeatedly with a machete. The aftermath here is all bloody, making them look even better. There's some really good suspense scenes that come from the stalking scenes, which are all lumped together in the one part and it's non-stop for the remainder of the film. The last really good part is two pretty sleazy scenes. The big one is a lesbian shower sequence that starts off with a great seduction scene that really goes overboard nicely. The other one is a scene during the flashback, showing how one discovers her sister's dead body. For reasons not made clear, the sister disrobed before she offed herself, and when she rushes over to the bed in a state of shock, she briefly cops a feel before realizing what she's doing and quickly jerking her hand away. These here make the film interesting.

The Bad News: This one does have a couple of big flaws. This one does manage to get by with a pretty confusing back-story. This one does have some problems spitting it out, as it starts to explain it before cutting to something else, then takes awhile to come back and repeats the process. This makes the back-story a little jumbled and hard to follow, which is quite hard. There's a large section of the film that is awfully dull and boring. Since most of the good parts are at the end, that leaves the beginning of the film with hardly anything worthwhile. Most of that is taken up with incredibly boring conversations with the girls over what they're going to do on the trip with the occasional freak-out. This is really hard to get through, as there's nothing going on, the talking comprises the bulk of what is going on and it isn't that interesting since it all comes back to the same things over and over again. This doesn't inspire anything but boredom and never really does much to improve upon that. The last flaw is that there's a really lame sequence that nearly ruins the film. It's the sequence in the bar where the heavy metal band plays. This stops dead in the film's tracks to portray a really lame song that has nothing to do with the film and really has no place in the film. These all lower the film down somewhat.

The Final Verdict: With a pretty much equal amount of flaws and positives, this one can only come out about even. This is really only for those who are really entertained by the type of film or in the mood for harmless entertainment, while those who aren't into these types won't find a whole lot with it.

Rated R: Graphic Violence, Graphic Language, Nudity and drug use

Bad execution, promising hints

[telepsa · 3/10 · 25 December 2006]

When I saw El Charro, the first thought that popped on my mind was that this movie should be named "The Curse of What Could Have Been". That is, if the scenario actually made sense. The movie begins with Maria, a rather annoying girl mourning the suicide of her sister (and by the way, we never do find out what made Lucia kill herself), going on a small vacation with four "friends". Incidentally, the friends are four archetypes, such as the good old American Beauty (the only one who cares about Maria, apparently), a hip hop star wannabe and a goth pinup would be. Curiously enough, the last two get along fairly well and seem to enjoy the same kind of music. How that is possible, one can only wonder. How do you we get to the juicy parts? After a lot of patience. The script is unbelievably slow and 3/4 of the movie seem to serve as filler. This was especially noticeable in the bar scene. The girls, after having a brush with the law (avoided because the driver takes the mutter into her own mouth, er, hands), decide to stop in a bar and drink before continuing their ride. Sounds only natural, correct? That is exactly what we would do if we were on a trip between states, escorted by police in a bar. The bar, operated by a fundamentalist American with bad taste in music, seems to be patronized by a weird mix of hillbillies and psychos. When the girls want to leave (understandably so), the police officer makes them sit down because they will "miss the show". The movie then proceeds to show us a goth guy in a suit screeching in an old microphone lyrics that apparently should tune us in the movie, because they are relevant to the heroine's situation. ...Ok guys, you've stumped me. The patrons, BY DEFINITION, should rise as one and get that idiot of the stage, for one. He is completely irrelevant to the movie. He is filler. The whole scene is filler, as every clue that is revealed is just not important enough to justify this travesty. Even though it is true that the actresses don't act in this to save their lives, the truth is that they are given almost no space to even try. The characters are flat and two-dimensional, trapped in their own delusional worlds. No growing for the heroine during the length of the movie. She doesn't, say, come to terms with her sister's suicide. She doesn't even save herself. An angel with fake wings and a tattoo does it for her. This is a shame, because this movie does have a couple of nice scenes (when the crew doesn't go wild with the camera, that is). An old time movie sequence in the middle of the movie gives the story away in a much more interesting way that the heroine would ever be able to. The music at the approaching of El Charro is rather good. El Charro himself, although dumber than Jason the Hockey Mask Boy, has a couple of nice scenes and a certain presence. It's not his fault he's not given enough space to actually DO something beyond slash like there's no tomorrow. and why slash, anyway? Why not just a gun? What is the justification behind this? There is none. The script in this is just terrible, plain and simple. The actors are uninspired. When closing in, El Charro looks like a black metal fan with bad, bad corpse painting on (Immortal would kick his ass). The pace is slow, the sex scenes not really that interesting (and that WAS a shame), and the deaths find the viewers completely supporting of the ghost. I would have done it too, El Charro. It's OK.

not even good as a B movie

[Kerry_E_White · 1/10 · 18 February 2006]

I can't stand to start a movie and not finish, even if its bad, but this movie is agonizing to watch! The acting is horrible, the characters implausible, the actresses are extremely annoying, and the plot is cliché and simplistic. Even the usually redeeming quality of partial nudity is negated by the fact that the girls are ugly. I enjoy a little cheese and a funny B movie, but this movie is worthless even for that. I got the DVD free and its about as valuable as an AOL CD. This movie isn't worth writing a review about, I do so only to warn you. I'd rather eat a turd than watch such a pitiful attempt at cinema. The fake blood isn't even the right color, its pink. What really ruins it is the ridiculous casting and character design, they had no idea what they were doing. The music is worse than bands that open for other bands at clubs with no cover charge.

What i thought

[cutshaw-2 · 2/10 · 15 December 2005]

First off, I didn't LOVE THIS MOVIE. I was bored out of my mind.

SPOILERS

Did anyone else think that the movie was leading up to the roommate being involved somehow in the whole El Charro thing. Here's some suspicious things:

1. Forces lead to go on vacation with 2 people who despise her. That should be relaxing. 2. Takes her out to the desert where El Charro dwells. 3. Goes to her uncle's house with religious statues and altars all over the place. Totally normal, and of course the uncle is never seen (perhaps the religious items were taken from the director's home) 4. Shoves any type of pill down her good friend's throat, even going so far as to trust the evil goth girl, who spits on the ground she walks on, for sleeping pills 5. Low angle shot of roommate looking down at suffering friend smiling and saying "That's what friends are for." 6. Disappears completely for about a third of the final act (When she shows up again she was just showing some dude the house, for 115 hours!) 7. Suddenly changes from good girl to bar tramp, ready to get it on on the hood of a car in front of the house in a clearly lit area. Certainly she'd have to know everyone is dead to do that. 8. Killed off screen (for the life of me I couldn't understand why she was screaming since she was clearly hiding some nefarious, evil pact with the creature)

Probably, to answer my own question, she was just a poorly conceived character like the rest of the cast (these people make the cast of The Squid and the Whale seem like Leave it to Beaver. What a bunch of you-know-what-holes). I think this is an example of a the main creative forces (if you wanna call em that) behind the project dumbing themselves down to work in such a shoddy genre. They sat on their pedestals and knew they were only making a lousy horror movie, so don't get worried about anything, those horror idiots will eat up anything. Well, I'll make an agreement, stay out of my genre, and I'll stay out of pretentious student films.

P.S. Sorry about writing in CAPS earlier, I just thought it might be funny if the director saw that and got excited, then was let down when he read the rest. Revenge is a dish best served cold.

What I do for Danny Trejo

[lastliberal · 3/10 · 3 November 2007]

OK, I love seeing Danny Trejo in films. I didn't actually see him in this one, as he was the voice of El Charro. El Carro (Andrew Bryniarski) was too busy swinging a machete to speak, I guess.

Maria is a neurotic mess whose sister committed suicide and is being stalked by El Charro because of some wrong done by an ancestor. She joins her friend Christina (Heidi Androl) and two other girls on a trip to Arizona. Good that they had Tanya (Kathryn Taylor, Miss Kansas USA) along to handle the cop when they got a speeding ticket.

Best performance in the film was definitely KellyDawn Malloy as a goth chick who did a shower duet with Tabitha Stevens.

Great looking slasher, but the appearance of Archangel Michael and the ending left a lot to be desired, as did the rednecks the girls hooked up with.

How Does Garbage Like This Actually Get Funded?

[torre_romance · 1/10 · 12 September 2008]

Look; I don't understand how any one could have thought this was worth the time to produce or direct, and the money that goes along with that. It's unbelievable that a film made in the 21st century could be this elementary visually. I cannot find one good thing about this movie, and I did try. The acting is terrible (like a group of college students were pulled out of class, handed the script, and told to do their best), the script is very weak, and the characters do not relate to one another at all. To be honest; I think you could give a group of high school students (each in the bottom 5% of their class) $200, a camera, two gallons of red corn syrup, and a three days to work, and they would put together a better horror flick that this.

Not Too Bad Depdending On How You View It

[Norrel122 · 4/10 · 14 June 2008]

When I saw this movie, it struck me as more of a comedy with a horror ending hence the reason why I rated it a 4. If rated from the perspective of a horror, I give it a really generous 3. Most of the movie will make you laugh if you watch it without the expectation of it being a horror. The acting seems to be spitefully lame which adds to it's comedic effect. You need to be naive or really young to enjoy this as a horror. If you're looking for a good scare, THIS IS NOT THE MOVIE FOR YOU!!! If you're into cheesy horror films because you're bored and you need a good laugh, this would give Troll 2 serious competition. You'll laugh at the fact that someone made this movie and labeled it a horror.

Awful Movie!

[supersky · 1/10 · 14 August 2005]

Damn this movie sucked, never in my lifetime have I been so angry and disappointed after wasting my time watching this piece of junk! It contains nothing but bad acting and a lot of awful effects! There is no plot at all in this movie and the things that the characters experience does not hang together at all. I cannot believe that anyone would rate this movie higher than rating it as awful (must be some kind of "sympathy act" if you choose to anyway). I seriously do not wish for anybody to waste money nor time on this movie.

Damn this movie sucked, never in my lifetime have I been so angry and disappointed after wasting my time watching this piece of junk! It contains nothing but bad acting and a lot of awful effects! There is no plot at all in this movie and the things that the characters experience does not hang together at all. I cannot believe that anyone would rate this movie higher than rating it as awful (must be some kind of "sympathy act" if you choose to anyway). I seriously do not wish for anybody to waste money nor time on this movie.

another beer coaster

[tmyer100 · 1/10 · 6 October 2006]

How does this movie even get to stores? If you are thinking about buying this movie, don't! I wouldn't even rent it. The only value in watching the movie is that it is quite funny, unintentionally, at times just because it is so horrible. I would expect this quality from maybe a high school film class, but I consider it a horrible injustice that it has made it onto the shelves of a movie rental store. So once again if you want to laugh at the bad acting, weak plot, horrible makeup, and cheesy effects then by all means watch this movie. But if you value your time, you might want to stay away from this one. I want my hour and a half back!

Damn fine movie.

[esg-2 · 10/10 · 2 April 2005]

Recently witnessed the premiere of a damn fine movie, "The Curse of El Charro" - at Raleigh Studios in Hollywood. Take "Friday the 13th" add Twin Peaks send-ups, apocalyptic dream sequences and visual references to German Expressionist/Communist cinema. Sprinkle blood into a lesbian shower scene. You don't like that? What's wrong with you?

El Charro himself is as memorable as they come. His sunken mouth, the dragged machete, his mayhem, the horror. I hope this is just the beginning of a potentially classic franchise. Also - brilliant score . . . great sound design.

I'm afraid one reviewer missed the point regarding the supporting actresses. The girls in "Friday the 13th" weren't acting for Oscars, either, and they all die in the end, anyway. I found the lead actress wholly convincing as a magnet for darkness.

This director rocks. Lemmy is in this film! & I saw Alice Cooper at the premiere! I heard this was Rich Ragsdales first film. Here's to many more!

A horrific failure!

[johnd-79 · 6 December 2007]

I will be short. This movie isn't worth your time and I wonder why it was even made in the first place. There is simply nothing to it. Yeah, you can run it when you have trouble falling asleep, but, PLEASE, don't rent it - simply download it off the net. Otherwise you're throwing your money away. Sorry, creators of the film, but that's the way it is. You think before you make something, right? Maybe you will learn next time. I am having difficulties writing about this movie, simply because there is not anything to write about. The only comment is: no comments.

So if you're interested - watch it. One time was too much for me.

Ivar

Super slow, dull, Arizona New Mexico desert feeling film...creepy in small parts

[Beyondtherain · 7/10 · 14 April 2020]

This film had bad moments, really all they needed to do was have more cheesy kills, and more screen time for the killer. Dull movie, spooky looking killer!

Not as crap as I thought it would be....

[corneloius_lancaster · 4/10 · 1 April 2006]

Well, I fully agree on the script being absolute crap. Who ever wrote that must have had an IQ of less than 2. The acting was also not impressive but whoever expected it to be was out of their mind. This is not the kind of thing where you would expect Academy performances, so who cares about that?

I honestly believe that whoever compared this film to Twin Peaks was definitely high on crack or crank or something. Whatever it is, please give me some. I cannot fathom how there could be any comparison to something as brilliant as twin peaks to this. It's like comparing A Clockwork Orange to Napoleon Dynamite. Anyhow, I thought that it could be worse.... Than again, I was anticipating the worst. I did like the artsy bits like the beginning and the back story.

P.S. The blonde kid singing that song with the dead pigeon was pitiful!!!

Some gems among the flotsam...

[maf-31 · 2 October 2006]

A very mixed effort, the inspiration is there, but a _lot_ of the execution is poor. It does however boast a couple of scenes that make it into the decade's short list of horror scenes. 1. When the girls enter the desert bar they are suddenly overtaken by a one-step-too-far feeling with nothing they can pin it on. Ugly people, weird talk, and a hint of threat that are clearly too much even for the self-styled goth girl and their unease is symbolized, reinforced and given focus in a stage show that's simple, hypnotic and unforgettable. Unfortunately the tension in that scene isn't lessened, but almost totally abandoned and it never really recovers. 2. The second scene is when the heroine (who doesn't understand simple Spanish despite clearly being Hispanic) has a vision in the style of a silent movie with title cards clearly directed at her. Unfortunately, the revelation turns the movie into an idiot-plot movie as she doesn't understand what's going on, even after being told exactly what's going on and I lost patience with her long before the final reel. The main monster himself is unfrightening and far too conventional. With loads of religious symbolism and references to Mexican folk art/lore I'd normally want to take a second look, but the deeply annoying cast keeps me from it. I'd like to see more from the filmmakers if they tone down the stereotypes and overacting (I blame the director more than the actors there) and find a better framework for their particular vision.