EL MARIACHI (2014) – This Mexican television series directed by Salvador Cartas was loosely based on the 1992 Robert Rodriguez movie of the same name and its sequels, Desperado (1995) and Once Upon a Time in Mexico (2003). It’s no secret that Rodriguez himself is not fond of this series. According to some sources Sony allegedly made a tentative notification of their plans to the writer/ director and then ran with it without further input from him.
Regular readers of Balladeer’s Blog know how much I love and praise the original El Mariachi movies. The title character, who starts out the trilogy as a struggling mariachi guitar player who winds up having to go all Die Hard on Mexican drug cartels, was played by Carlos Gallardo in 1992 and then Antonio Banderas in 1995 and 2003.
The series of movies certainly seemed to partially inspire the later Sicario films, but I much prefer Rodriguez’s flicks. The El Mariachi television program is, unfortunately, inferior to both franchises. That’s a shame because lead actor Ivan Arana certainly looks the part and Martha Higareda as the hero’s love interest Celeste is just the right mix of sultriness and butt-kicking badness. For some reason photos of Higareda don’t come close to capturing her full allure, but seen in motion she’s even more impressive.
Like in the Robert Rodriguez films, the up and coming mariachi player is mistaken for a Mexican criminal who is carrying a similar guitar case. From there he gets caught up in a battle with Mexico’s ever more powerful drug cartels.
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Here at Independent Voter site Balladeer’s Blog I’ve been getting a lot of comments and emails asking why I haven’t been weighing in on Joe Biden’s utterly disastrous handling of Afghanistan. 
From the Democrats at The Atlantic – “
WHAT IF? Vol 1 #1 (February 1977) 
Joe Biden has been part of every American policy which the rest of the world has disapproved of for nearly 50 years now. Joe Biden has utterly destroyed all the help given to the working class and the poor over the preceding 4 years. Joe Biden has wiped out untold numbers of jobs for Americans and destroyed America’s energy independence that was formed over the preceding 4 years. 
KUNG FAUX (2003) – Created and crafted by Mic Neumann, this half-hour comedy series was basically a hip hop version of old movies and television shows that overdubbed non-comedies with comedic dialogue, music and sound effects. In Kung Faux‘s case it featured re-edited and highly stylized martial arts films from the 1970s overdubbed with contemporary music and a hip hop comedic sensibility. 
Though Kung Faux brands this treatment as “dubtitling” as a nod to dubbed and subtitled dialogue, the approach debuted on vintage television shows like Fractured Flickers (1963), in which celebrities would dub improvised comedic dialogue over old silent movies. 
Al Capone had to be brought down over his taxes even though he was guilty of far worse. Democrat Andrew Cuomo had to be brought down over his sexual harassment of women after the Biden regime shut down investigations about Cuomo’s alleged role in the deaths of thousands of elderly people in New York nursing homes. 
Balladeer’s Blog once again gives a shoutout to Alvarez Galloso’s SOSCuba, one of the best Cuba Libre-themed tags. Among his latest: 
How has a movie NOT been made about this event yet? On August 10th of 2003 Russian Cosmonaut Yuri Malenchenko, stationed on board the International Space Station, was married in a long-distance ceremony via satellite hookup to Ekaterina Dmitrieva, who was physically at the Johnson Space Center in Texas. 
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