Danny Trejo returns and Machete and Michelle Rodriguez is back as Shé in "Machete Kills". Photo by Rico Torres.
Let’s see here. Machete Kills is a sequel to a film based on a fake trailer directed by Robert Rodriguez. And it features an unknown (hah!) named Carlos Estévez as United States President Rathcock. And it features Walton Goggins, Cuba Gooding Jr., Lady Gaga and Antonio Banderas all playing the same assassin. And we get to see Alexa Vega all grown up in ass-less chaps and Sofia Vergara with machine gun boobies. And it stars Danny Trejo reprising his role as Machete Cortez, a former federale hired by the president to prevent a Mexican revolutionary from destroying Washington D.C. I’m there!
Madame Desdemona (Sofia Vergara) leads a pack of pistol-packing prostitutes in "Mechete Kills". Photo by Rico Torres.
Presented in all the same gritty grindhouse glory as the original Machete, Machete Kills is an onslaught of gratuitous T&A, absurd gore and clever dialogue as Machete uncovers a plot by a Mexican mercenary with multiple personalities (Demián Bichir) to blow up our nation’s capital. But not before an opening sequence that includes Machete and Sartana (Jessica Alba) taking on a small army wearing luchador masks near the Mexican border. But once he gets his assignment and makes a run for the border to save Washington, there are pretty much no boundaries on the intentionally exploitative and bloody battles that Machete is forced to engage in.
In case you still think of Alexa Vega as a Spy Kid, her cleavege and athletic skills in "Machete Kills" will make you forget all about that.
Along the way, Machete encounters a Texas sheriff (William Sadler) with a hard-on for catching border jumpers, a whorehouse full of seductive killers, a pageant girl with a secret stash of advanced weaponry (Amber Heard) and an unstoppable martial artist with Terminator-like resolve (Marko Zaror). Then there’s Luther Voz, a weapons manufacturer played by Mel Gibson whose villainous name should be enough to clue you in on his role in Machete’s mission. And when Voz introduces Machete to an arsenal of experimental weaponry it’s not the high tech machete that initially draws Machete’s attention, but a gun that Voz warns him is not working properly yet as it keeps turning things inside out (in other words, the ultimate in comedic foreshadowing). Additional foreshadowing (without giving away too much) comes in the form of Voz’s obsession with Star Wars, all the way down to his own personal landspeeder. But we’ll get to that in a year or so, I suspect, based on the pulpy trailer that appears at the beginning and end of this film.
Perhaps in keeping with the the antihero’s name and choice of weaponry, Machete Kills makes gluttonously good use of blades, especially those attached to helicopters. Like many of Rodriguez’ previous films, it proudly borrows from low budget movies from the ’70s and ’80s without shame. And it’s that type of homage that makes such an enjoyable film despite – no, because of – its blatant absurdity.