This time, Machete (Danny Trejo) is hired by the President of the United States (Charlie Sheen) to track down a Mexican warlord/revolutionary (Demian Bichir), who has a nuclear bomb aimed at Washington D.C. Things go from bad to worse, as arms dealer Luther Voss (Mel Gibson) brings additional heat on Machete with his array of futuristic weapons and planned world destruction for a profit.
Machete Kills follows similar territory as its predecessor, but unfortunately doesn't reach the same heights. There is still plenty of cheap gore and depravity abound, just with not as fun being offered up while doing so. A lot of this can be attributed to Rodriguez outsourcing the scriptwriting to first-time screenwriter Kyle Ward. Ward definitely knows how to hurl a lot of ridiculous scenarios and disembodied bodies at the audience, it's just not done with the same clever, self-aware tone that Rodriguez did it with in the first installment. Ward tries to follow the blueprint the first film laid out but ends up coming up with a second-rate version of the same elements that made the original so special (Case in point, beating the originals "Machete Don't Text" line being beaten into the ground with about 15 "Machete" don't lines scattered throughout the film.) In addition to the screenwriting woes, some of the new casting additions don't really gel with the film's insane vibe. Sofia Vergara and Amber Heard stumble with the material, taking their respective characters too far on the corniness scale. Vergara, in particular, completely forced her performance and dragged down the film's quality every minute she was on-screen.
Machete Kills may not deliver the same level of B-movie thrills as the original, but it's also not completely devoid of them either. There is still a good amount of laughs and clever, insane kills that made the original such a pleasure to watch. The new sci-fi elements added in the final act added a whole new layer to the glorious camp of this film. If you thought the first had over-the-top kills, wait till you see what this film has in store with the addition of futuristic, alien-esque weaponry to the fold. Adding to the fun of the kills and exploitative vibe is a plethora of new faces to the series that are more-than-game for the bloody tomfoolery. The character of "El Chameleon", an assassin that reveals a new face each time someones sees them commit a crime, offers up a revolving door of cameos that are all hilarious. It was really fun to see which actor was going to be next line in when they pulled their face off to reveal their new disguise and made for a consistently interesting character (it's not really a major spoiler, but about half of the major actors billed in this film are attached to this role.)
Though El Chamelon is a entertaining side character, the two primary antagonists of the film provide the most whacked-out thrills. Mel Gibson finally plays a role that matches his real-life craziness as a telepathic, zany arms-dealer with a penchant for outer space. Gibson hasn't brought this much charisma to a role since his glory days of the 80's and 90's and even though it's in such a wildly bonkers role, It's good to see Gibson getting fully into a performance for the first time in a long time. Demain Bachir is also properly prosperous and deranged as Mendez, a Mexican revolutionary with multiple personalities. The character changes on a whim and Bachir accentuates the madness of the character by either being believably psychotic or shockingly compassionate depending on whatever state of mind Mendez is in. While most of the film doesn't live up to original, Bachir's unpredictable, cracked-out performance is the best thing to appear in either Machete film. Machete Kills is certainly absurd, gory and loaded with bizzaro performances, but it isn't nearly as fun or creative in its B-movie lunacy as the original was.
3.5/5 Stars
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