Friday 30 May 2014

"Mariachi Gringo" (The Guardian 30/05/14)


Mariachi Gringo **
Dir: Tom Gustafson. With: Shawn Ashmore, Martha Higareda, Kate Burton. 107 mins. Cert: NC

Are distributors utilising some hidden Lucky Dip option on Netflix in deciding what to release? Case in point: this sunny, good-natured yet inescapably middling indie about a depressed Kansas farmboy (minor X-Man Shawn Ashmore) who finds unlikely joy in becoming a mariachi. Tom Gustafson’s film proves genial to a fault: those golden cornfields don’t appear remotely depressing, while raven-haired waitress Martha Higareda exists solely to turn a white male frown upside down. Overlook its dramatic shortcomings, and you’ll still require a tolerance for music waved politely away in restaurants: after 107 minutes of pseudo-Calexicana, I’d be happy never to hear another insistent trumpet again. 

Mariachi Gringo opens in selected cinemas from today.

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