Good concept, poorly executed.

Better Late Then Never

n my opinion it was a great movie with some interesting elements, even though having some plot holes and the ending probably was just too messy and crammed together, but still fun to watch and not your casual movie that is similar to all other ones.

A clunky actioner with a handful of cool moments.

This movie rocked. I don't know how I missed seeing this one but it was major influenced by Natural Born Killers, True Romance and even smatterings of Pulp Fiction but this one can hold its own.Javiar Bardem hooks up with Rosie Perez to commit awful crimes together. He is heavy into voodoo rituals and chums with Screamin' Jay Hawkins who plays his voodoo helper. Rosie meets him and the two instantly hit it off. The two of them end up kidnapping a young American couple and bringing them along for a job he's got going involving a truckload of fetuses in jars.This flick is soaked with seedy characters. The one who steals the show though is James Gandolfini. He plays the detective who's been after Bardem and keeps pursuing him no matter what happens. He gets hit by cars, thrown off of trucks, punched and shot.Make sure you watch the 2 hour 5 minute version which is the longest as the other prints might be missing the good stuff. Most of the content is disturbing as they each rape the couple they take hostage and randomly kill throughout the film. Mobsters, drug dealers, assassins and scumbags all get in the way of Perdita Durango and her voodoo boyfriend which Bardem plays to a tee. Just an awesome flick. You have to watch this one.

Perdita Durango (Rosie Perez) is at an airport when some gringo tries to be nice with her, saying his name and that he is going to Arizona. Perdita say that to the gringo that if he wants to take her to Arizona, he must cover all and in change she will give him what he wants and also they can make some business, you know some jobs for men. The gringo feels nervous and left the place. That's the way we first know Perdita and soon we will know Romeo Dolorosa (Javier Bardem), a natural born killer with a belief. Romeo is the kind of criminal who is so dam crazy that even his own partners are very nervous while they are stealing something. There is a crazy passion between Romeo and Perdita and upon that we have a unique love story with two sick minds.The plot is quite simple and follows Romeo in a very important job for a big crime boss. Of course his belief will have an important place in this story and at the same time the classic clinging police will be chasing him through the Mexican border. The film is spoken in Spanish and English and the two Americans that Romeo and Perdita kidnap for the ritual are the perfect way to show, in a very funny and sick way, the stereotype of how Americans looks Mexico and the rest of Latin America. Duane (Harley Cross) and Estrellita (Aimee Graham) are two young American lovers that have the bad luck to be blond and to be in the same place that Romeo and Perdita were. It is so damn funny when they arrive to Mexico and Duane says something like "it looks like another planet". Of course the scenes of Romeo's sick rituals of Santeria are one of the reasons of why this film was a failure in America but for me is just quite funny to see Bardem with his cool lock. Anyway, for matters of luck or destiny or whatever that ritual will never be completed and the two young Americans will end being just a complication for the job that Romeo must do, just as that clinging police who will be the reason of why Romeo ends being like a traitor to the criminal boss Santos. So when we realize that the end of Romeo is just matter of time, is just strange that the Americans, after Perdita release them, feels even sorry of her because is a fact that they were near to be the victims of the ritual but in the end their luck or destiny keep them alive and now with a better and stronger relationship and sexual life. If may sound strange but all of that was thanks to their kidnappers even that Romeo and Perdita didn't have those intentions.About the cast:is just amazing; Javier Bardem is just so damn great. His memorable performance is probably my second personal favourite of him being Anton of No Country for Old Men my personal favourite, of course. Romeo has a very mystical past believing in many saints and later practicing rituals in order to satisfy his gods. He has many memorable scenes (the bank rob with his Santo mask is just great) and the end that he always wanted (another amazing scene). Rosie Perez is also great and very sexy as Perdita. There are few things that we know about Perdita but one thing is for sure: she found love. The support cast is also terrific; James Gandolfini, yes Tony Soprano, is the police who will have a really hard but hilarious time in his attempt to end with Romeo. The director of "Sid and Nancy", "Walker" and "Repo Man", Alex Cox, is just hilarious as the partner of Gandolfini's character. I really don't know why this director has appear in many Mexican films, being his performance in "La Ley De Herodes" the one that I remember the most. Also a f*cking Bichir is here, the brother of Javier Bardem, Screamin Jay Hawkins and Miguel Galvan, a very well-know comedian in Mexico who recently passed away, as the old friend of Romeo with only one arm.Conclusion: As I write before, those scenes of Romeo's rituals like the sex scenes are enough reasons to say that this film is not for everybody. For my money this picture is another gem of De la Iglesia that ranks along with "El Dia De la Bestia" in my favourites of him. I do recommend this film to anyone but mostly to people who like the similar films "Wild at Heart" (David Lynch,1990) and "Natural Born Killers" (Oliver Stone,1994). I know there are many fans of those films so check this film. 2 hours of a sick love story that after all is a sick and hilarious trip to the border.

A wild Spanish roller coaster ride of a film has Rosie Perez and witch doctor Javier Bardem as two lovers on the run, kidnapping a couple of very irritating teenagers with an idea of using them in some bizarre sacrificial ceremony (these kids were so hateful, I couldn't wait). All of this feels kind of familiar, and it bounces all over the place. However, seeing Rosie Perez undertaking the part of a skanky slut is probably the best use I've seen her put to so far, and I must admit that Bardem is very powerful and charismatic in what is otherwise a pretty messed up film.*1/2 out of ****

Well done technically, well made, well acted, but an awful, awful, awful story. The scummiest, skankiest, nastiest, cruelest, vilest characters with not a sliver of redeeming likable quality are the heroes of this film. The violence and rape is graphic and I got the impression was being rubbed in the audience's face. These are people you wait for someone like Clint Eastwood, or El Mariachi to come and blow up, but no such person appears here, because these people are supposed to be the heroes - the ones we are supposed to cheer on. I felt more compassion for Hitler than these people. I liked Dr. Hannibal more than these people. Someone must have sat down and tried to think of all the worst characteristics you could create in human beings, with the worst possible circumstances in which they could be expressed. Ewwww.