Comeuppance Reviews
A mysterious man, known only as "The Man" (Adkins) arrives in the small Mexican town of El Fronteras with a duffel bag filled with cash. He finds the town less than hospitable, and as the local gang tries to steal his loot, through a series of flashbacks, we find out how he got into this predicament. With Lt. West (Slater) of the New Mexico police crossing the border to go hot on his trail, The Man has plenty to contend with, but with the help of local barmaid Anna (Yates) he just may ride off into the sunset with everything he wants. But can this happen in such a violent place? Sadly, very sadly, we found El Gringo to be a disappointment. You'd think having Scott Adkins and Christian Slater in a movie together would be a surefire winner that could overcome any potential drawbacks elsewhere. It turns out that assumption was incorrect, and you know what happens when you assume. The problem is, it's weighted down with those annoying modern, overly-slick editing tricks that we're not in love with, to say the least. Why directors and editors feel they need to do this remains unknown. (It should be noted that the editor's name is Don Adams, and he does indeed need to get smart). They must think it's helping, but it's really, really not. With a bunch of quick cuts, seizure-inducing flashes, CGI all over the place, and self-consciously "wacky" music and situations, the movie dooms itself. The whole outing has a vibe that it's trying super-hard to be cool, but it's trying too hard. All it had to do was let the magic of Adkins and Slater happen. And get out of the way. But its obsession with being a post-Tarantino irony-laced jaunt puts the kibosh on that.And it had so much potential for being genuinely cool. The movie sabotages itself by setting up a potentially cool situation, then squelching it, almost out of spite. So it sets itself up for failure, because even if something awesome does indeed happen, the overall tenor ruins it, because you can't go back and un-see what uncoolness you just saw. And at 103 minutes, it wears out its welcome. Besides having to witness the character of "The Man" (which isn't at all stolen from Sergio Leone) in a variety of situations frustrating to him, the viewers also get frustrated. The whole thing has a distasteful Missionary Man (2007) vibe, and director Rodriguez even made a movie with Dolph, Stash House (2012), which is acknowledged to be one of Dolph's worst, even worse than Missionary Man.Of course, Scott Adkins is always boss, and he does execute some outstanding moves on the baddies in the beat-em-up scenes, but, ultimately, it's very hard to care. Despite some classics like the "walking away from an explosion" and the "sideways jump/dive while shooting", it's just not enough this time. Even the fruit cart cliché is here. But a dud in the Adkins canon was bound to happen eventually, as he has had a long string of winners, and no actor, or gambler for that matter, has had an unbroken streak. But perhaps the most unsettling thing about this particular Adkins performance is that his distinctive British accent is gone, in favor of an unnecessary American voice. Just another El Gringo misstep, it seems.Speaking of missteps, there's the matter of the title song. One of the best and most noteworthy aspects of the movie was the song by Manowar, but it's only heard during the end credits. It would have been awesome to hear it during a shootout or training sequence. But no, another wasted opportunity. Despite the titans Adkins and Slater, there's actually very little to recommend about El Gringo, as much as it pains us to say it.
Joseph Su'a
First of all, I haven't seen Get The Gringo, so I won't compare the two. Now, El Gringo has a small plot; Man has a bag, hides in Mexico, and once people find out there's a large amount of money in the bag, they hunt him down. There's a couple of twists and turns, which are poorly executed. The acting isn't Oscar worthy, the dialogue is pure cheese, the humor feels out of place, the editing is effed up choppy, but the action sequences are awesome and was enough to hold my interest. I'd say it's the type of movie I'd have playing in the background while I'm doing other things. Just because I'm giving it a low rating doesn't mean it's bad.4/10
Hellmant
'EL GRINGO': Four Stars (Out of Five) Eduardo Rodriquez directed this Scott Adkins action vehicle for After Dark Films (as part of their expansion into the action genre). It was written by Jonathan Stokes and produced by action master Joel Silver! It costars Yvette Yates, Erando Gonzalez and Christian Slater. The film is a great throwback to spaghetti westerns and other old school action films and continues to showcase the remarkable talents of Scott Adkins as a new leading man action hero.Adkins plays a DEA agent (who is never named, in true spaghetti western fashion) who is setup and attacked in the middle of the dessert. His partners are killed but he manages to escape (after killing the gunmen who attacked him). He stages his own death and flees into Mexico with a bag full of drug money. He runs into hostility there wherever he goes as the locals don't seem to want him in their town. He finds a little help from a local bar owner (Yates) but soon finds a ton of opposition from the local corrupt sheriff (Gonzalez), and his drug cartel thugs, as well as his old DEA boss (Slater), who tracks him down.The movie is a pretty impressive style over substance indie action film. Rodriguez's directing is cool and the script is fun. There's of course not a lot to the story but the action is almost nonstop and Adkins really shines as an action force to be reckoned with. It's nice to see someone other than Jason Statham still consistently making cool B action films. The movie was made for just $7 million but it's definitely not short on explosions or gun battles. This is the stuff that the action films of yesteryear were made of; just good old action loving fun!Watch our movie review show 'MOVIE TALK' at: http://youtu.be/Ie33IbZzmi0
blue141
Giving this film even a 1 makes me shudder. I have never seen such bad acting, heard such cheesy lines, looked at so many ugly people, sweaty boobs, or stupid townspeople on film. And that's just the OK folks. Even the dog was a loser. I want my thinking cap back, I lost it somewhere in this terrible mess of a movie. If there is a bath to be had in town, it's somewhere over the horizon that no one attempts to locate. And who wants to take a bath next to animal bones anyway. Wait, those ugly, dirty, sweaty boobs people, and their loser dog just might.Nasty, grimy, horrible, just awful, and those are the good points of this film.
