Hello ladies and gentlemen, Muldoon here coming off the high of Fantastic Fest, the most insane festival of fun films, great people, and good food set right in the heart of Texas. The fest has it's own handful of filmmakers that come back each year, familiar faces that bring their newest projects to the fest simply becasue they love being there. Nacho... Nacho Vigalondo - you can't go to Fantastic Fest and not hear/see/experience that crazy man (sweet man, too). One of the Fantastic Fest favorites is Marko Zaror, the insanely talented hulk of a human who's sheer combat skills demand to be seen on screen. You may or may not remember him from Robert Rodriguez's MACHETE KILLS where he played Mel Gibson's right hand man / super killer. Whatever your feelings on that movie, I doubt the bulk of folks out there fully understood how awesome it was for Zaror to be in the thing. It was jam packed with great actors who've rocked different movies all on their own - but primarily films from the US, not Chile - like our man Zaror. KILTRO, MIRAGE MAN, MANDRILL... The guy's the Steven Seagal (in his prime) of Chile. His last film, REDEEMER, which I barely caught on its last day at the fest - absolutely kicks more ass than you can imagine.
"Muldoon, come on... of course the action's going to be good." Damn straight, but it was also across the board in terms of style. There are a few fights where it's Marko, "Pardo / The Redeemer," fights against a small army of bad guys, but also a handful of legit one on one fights that are equally impressive. How director Ernesto Díaz Espinoza shoots his fight scenes is nothing short of beautiful. The hits are hard. The kicks are felt. The slow motion time remaps feel needed and just right. The film indeed plays with time a tad during each fight, sometimes for dramatic recognition and others simply becasue Zaror is just too freaking fast. Honestly, it's not human how fast this giant can move, but it's there on screen and displayed perfectly in each brutal fight. The thing's full of incredibly choreographed fights that will leave you chanting. Blood flying. Baddies getting exactly what they deserve. Pure fucking heartbeating fun. I haven't seen moves like this since EQUILIBRIUM, where there's a poetically balanced use of handguns and raw fists that just work so well together. "That guy's got a machine gun/sawed off shot gun... how in the hell could this character fight back?" This movie shows you how. It literally makes use of whatever is dressed into the scene, like a Jackie Chan level of "I'll use whatever is available to kick your ass." It's just incredible. Not to go into spoiler territory, but in one fight Zaror is about to get smashed with a beer bottle, but instead he grabs the bottle as it's about to make contact - shatters it in his own hand - turns it around and shoves it into the bad guy. It's that level of "Whoa!" that puts this movie on the level of all of our favorites from the 80's. "Jean Claude Van Damme... Stallone... Schwarzenegger... Zaror."
Check out this clip straight from the guys at Twitch (I love that site, go hit it up!):
"So the action is great, how about the acting?" Considering it's an action movie and the bulk of the thing is spent on incredible fights, you'd think Zaror might not be able to hold his own when it comes to "not" fighting. Rest assured he's great and it doesn't hurt that his character is a brooding Batman kind of guy. He's not just muscle, but shows real pain (emotional and physical). After the screening I heard a few folks mention Rodriguez's EL MARIACHI while discussing this movie. I still am having a hard time drawing parallels, but EL did have a drug lord at the center of it, "Moco." This film doesn't have a hard edged Moco, but it does have a little snot head of a villain played hilariously by Noah Segan (Kid freaking Blue himself). His character feels like a third generation mob boss, the kind of American punk I'd expect to see in Chile where he doesn't give two shits about the culture and while his men are being savagely beaten by "The Redeemer" and his nemesis "The Scorpion" all he can think about is coming up with his own "cool nickname." He's not intimidating, but you can feel the little shit's got power, even if it's power derived from money and nothing else. Noah's great in the thing and they played up the fact he's not a big badass, or that there's no way he could take on any of his many henchmen - he's the little smarmy dickhead who cares about one thing: money. It's also lovely to hear the primary reason Noah's in the film is due to everyone's love for Fantastic Fest and creating something because they all care - not at all a case of milking a production for all it's worth.
With all this talk of Zaror, I can't not talk about the film's director, the incredible Ernesto Díaz Espinoza. He's filled this film with incredible imagery (shots of the ocean / desert are breathtaking) while ensuring each fight scene feels real and brutal. He has an eye and lifts scenes from the very best (Lynch in one case here), which admittedly Tarantino does in each of his films. Ernesto has a unique vision that makes this film stand out. He's made a great film and I hope you ladies and gents have a chance to catch it. It's fun, gruesome at times, beautifully shot, and ultimately just a kick ass martial arts celebration of pure badass-ness. I've got no clue as to when or how it's rolling out, but hope you folks have the opportunity to see it.
- Mike McCutchen
"Muldoon"
Mike@aintitcool.com
