{"id":3798,"date":"2024-09-03T21:19:40","date_gmt":"2024-09-03T21:19:40","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/?p=3798"},"modified":"2024-10-14T11:56:37","modified_gmt":"2024-10-14T15:56:37","slug":"the-mexican","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/2024\/09\/03\/the-mexican\/","title":{"rendered":"The Mexican"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"The Mexican <\/strong>(2001)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 DreamWorks\/Comedy-Adventure\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 RT: 123 minutes\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Rated R (violence and language)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Director: Gore Verbinski\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Screenplay: J.H. Wyman\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Music: Alan Silvestri\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Cinematography: Darius Wolski\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Release date: March 2, 2001 (US)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Cast: Brad Pitt, Julia Roberts, James Gandolfini, Bob Balaban, J.K. Simmons, Sherman Augustus, Michael Cerveris, David Krumholtz, Castulo Guerra, Gene Hackman.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Box Office: $66.8M (US)\/$147.8M (World)<\/p>\n

Rating<\/strong>: ***<\/p>\n

\u00a0If Sam Peckinpah ever made a rom-com, it would probably turn out something like The Mexican<\/strong>, a wildly uneven but entertaining comedy-adventure starring Brad Pitt and Julia Roberts who don\u2019t share all that much screen time together. They may be the stars, but they\u2019re not the best thing about The Mexican<\/strong>. No, that would be James Gandolfini (The Sopranos) as a gay hitman named Leroy. He\u2019s the one who shares the most screen time with Roberts and they\u2019re very good together. It\u2019s this relationship that gives the movie its edge. It\u2019s what sets it apart from the countless other rom-com\/road trip movies that fade from memory an hour after seeing them.<\/p>\n

\u00a0The phrase \u201cit\u2019s complicated\u201d definitely applies to Jerry (Pitt) and Sam (Roberts). They argue constantly. She believes he\u2019s not fully committed to their relationship. When Jerry backs out of their trip to Las Vegas, she blows her top, throwing his belongings in the street while telling him how selfish he is. He has good reason for bailing. Because of a car accident that put a major crime figure in jail for five years, Jerry (who caused the accident) has to run errands for his second-in-command (Balaban, Ghost World) until the debt is paid off. The problem is he usually botches his assignments. You see, Jerry isn\u2019t the brightest bulb in the pack. He has one last chance or else he\u2019ll be killed. The prospect of his untimely death doesn\u2019t move Sam in the slightest. She tells Jerry if he takes the assignment (as if he has a choice), they\u2019re through. He gets on the plane and she hits the road to Vegas.<\/p>\n

Jerry\u2019s latest task should be easy enough. He\u2019s ordered to go to Mexico to retrieve an antique handgun (the \u201cMexican\u201d of the title) and bring it back to the States. Naturally, things go horribly awry and Jerry spends a lot of time trying to regain possession of the gun. It either gets stolen or taken from him by various persons. He can\u2019t seem to catch a break.<\/p>\n

\u00a0Meanwhile, on the road to Vegas, Sam gets kidnapped by Leroy. That is, after he saves her from being killed by a well-dressed black man (NFL star Augustus) at a rest stop facility. For the purposes of this review, it\u2019s not important why he kidnaps her. However, Sam knows it has something to do with whatever Jerry is involved in at the present time which only makes her madder at him. She complains to Leroy about Jerry and their imperfect relationship. As it turns out, he\u2019s not only a good listener; he has good advice to offer. Then she figures out he\u2019s gay. Leroy, in turn, opens up to Sam about his insecurities about his sexuality and appeal to other men. It\u2019s the oddest captor-captive relationship I\u2019ve ever seen.<\/p>\n

\u00a0I have to be honest. I found Roberts\u2019 character shrill and irritating. She blames Jerry for all their problems as a couple and while he\u2019s partly to blame, she\u2019s not completely guiltless. It takes two to tangle. Sam either can\u2019t see past her own needs to realize Jerry\u2019s life is in danger or she just doesn\u2019t care. Either way, she\u2019s the kind of girlfriend most guys try to avoid. Her character becomes slightly more bearable as the movie progresses. Pitt, on the other hand, has some nice comedy chops. He\u2019s funny as dimwitted, luckless Jerry. He\u2019s the kind of dope who thinks speaking Spanish entails putting the letter \u201co\u201d at the end of words. Again, being honest, I can see where it would be easy to lose patience with this guy. I can see how his lack of intelligence, luck and common sense would get on Sam\u2019s nerves. We, the audience, can laugh because we don\u2019t have to live with it. So then, the events of The Mexican<\/strong> serve as a radical form of relationship therapy. Okay, that\u2019s amusing.<\/p>\n

\u00a0Directed by Gore Verbinski (the Pirates of the Caribbean movies), The Mexican<\/strong> has some clever touches. There are a few different versions of the legend attached to \u201cThe Mexican\u201d. Each time a character tells their version, the picture turns to sepia like an old-time movie. There\u2019s also a funny running bit about a vicious dog that comes with the old, dilapidated truck Jerry buys from a Mexican peasant.<\/p>\n

\u00a0The problem with The Mexican<\/strong> is that Verbinski can\u2019t decide on a tone. Sometimes it\u2019s a rom-com; other times, it\u2019s a violent South-of-the-border action flick. It\u2019s an uneasy mix that sometimes struggles to find its footing. It also runs about a half-hour too long. The Mexican<\/strong> has its share of flaws, not the least of which is the two leads not making all that believable a couple, but I still liked it. It\u2019s on the weaker end of the three-star spectrum.\"\"<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Mexican (2001)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 DreamWorks\/Comedy-Adventure\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 RT: 123 minutes\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Rated R (violence and language)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Director: Gore Verbinski\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Screenplay: J.H. Wyman\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Music: Alan Silvestri\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Cinematography: Darius Wolski\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Release date: March 2, 2001 (US)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Cast: Brad Pitt, Julia Roberts, James Gandolfini, Bob Balaban, J.K. Simmons, Sherman Augustus, Michael Cerveris, David Krumholtz, Castulo Guerra, Gene Hackman.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Box Office: $66.8M (US)\/$147.8M […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":5488,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[18],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3798","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-comedies"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/09\/The-Mexican-PIC.jpg?fit=620%2C348&ssl=1","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3798","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3798"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3798\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5489,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3798\/revisions\/5489"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/5488"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3798"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3798"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3798"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}