Sharp as a Knife
Having witnessed his family murdered and being left to burn, former federale Machete (Danny Trejo) now lives in Texas working as a labourer and when he can't get work he earns money fighting. It is how he comes to the attention of Booth (Jeff Fahey) who wants him to kill Senator McLaughlin (Robert De Niro) who has a no tolerance regime when it comes to illegal immigrants crossing in to Texas from Mexico. But as Machete is about to do the job he realises he has become a target with a gun pointed at him. Riled by what is going on and backed up by Luz (Michelle Rodriguez), Sartana (Jessica Alba) and his brother turned Padre (Cheech Marin) they set about taking down the bad guys and bringing some justice back to the world.
What is Grindhouse? I have my definition of grindhouse which might be similar to others but then what makes a grindhouse movie a grindhouse movie and not just an over the top action movie. I actually don't know especially after watching "Machete" because whilst we have Mexicans what we have is an over the top action movie with plenty of violence, gore and nudity all of which are ingredients I watched in actions movies of the 80s including the tongue in cheek characters and dialogue. In truth it doesn't matter what your definition of grindhouse is as "Machete" is a lot of violent fun with memorable scenes such as someone's intestine being uses as a rope to escape with!
Now making sense of "Machete" is not something you should concern yourself with too much other than to say we have are tough guy Machete doing battle with a load of bad guys who try to use him and kill him. And battle he does in a variety of ways, using what ever is at hand to inflict damage be a bone scraper or a mop handle. And Machete is not the only kick butt person as we have Michelle Rodriguez and Jessica Alba as a couple of sexy butt kickers. Yes there is a storyline which features politicians, corruption and duplicity but it isn't really the focus.
The thing is that as much as "Machete" is about a tough hombre it is also a matter of style with elements such as an egg frying on a floor being as much a part of the movie as the amount of blood which spurts in to the air. It is hard to explain but anyone who has watched a Robert Rodriguez movie before will know what I mean as he has his own style from the camera angles to the music which make a movie distinctly his and entertaining at the same time.
What this all boils down to is that if you enjoy over the top action movies then "Machete" will be right up your street. It is completely over the top but entertaining for being so and features an impressive cast who excel under Rodriguez's styling.
