Once upon a time in Mexico - 2003

Not too bad, but Desperado was something else, much better. Desperado was cool, while this movie desperately tries to be cool. This movie can be fun, a lot of shooting and explosions and bizarre characters, but it also tries a complicated plot that doesn’t really work.
Its good points are: Antonio Banderas, again playing the same character from Desperado, and Johnny Depp, playing a crazy CIA agent.  
Let’s try the plot:
The president is a good man who wants to fight the criminals. Barrillo is a dangerous drug lord, very powerful. Barrillo wants to assassinate the president using corrupt general Marquez as the hitman. Marquez is the one who killed El’s wife and daughter. 
Sands puts a retired FBI agent on Barrillo’s track, to try find evidence against him. Sands also gives El Mariachi a task, to kill Marquez after he’s killed the president. He walks around plotting and planning, and not everything makes real sense if you ask me; he sometimes kills regular people for no apparent reason. One thing that does make sense is that his secret plan is to take all the money promised to Marquez for the assassination and run away with FBI girl Eva Mendez (AFN is written on the jacket, what is AFN??). Sands may be a US agent but is not a good guy: he sent Trejo to find El Mariachi, and in order to lure him out Trejo killed an innocent man. Not only that, but he killed a cook and a waitress for no reason. 
El calls his band, his two friends, to help him in this mission. Ramirez talks to Billy, a thug working for Barrillo, and Billy tells him right away that he’s willing to be on his side, that he’s sick of that life and is prepared to face the charges against him if the FBI takes him out of there and back to the United States. 
Sands is betrayed by his girl who reveals to be Barrillo’s daughter, and they cut off his eyes saying he saw too much, and after that they let him go.. 
There’s a revolution on the streets and El comes in time to save the president’s life. Ramirez is taken prisoner but Billy frees him. When they both confront Barrillo, Billy is shot but Ramirez is saved by El.
El also kills Marquez, avenging his wife’s death. Marquez was late because he didn’t expect the revolution, the people turning against his soldiers.
Sands needs the help of a child in a yellow shirt because now he can’t see; he manages to kill quite a few before being shot in the knees. When the girl Mendes sees him face down in the street she goes to him for no clear reason, other than to play with him, and he kills her. 
The president is saved, El’s friends go away with lots of money, all the bad guys are dead. Trejo is also dead, killed by Barrillo after he revealed to him Sands plan and gave him El. 
At the end we see the boy with the yellow shirt approaching the bodies and seeing Sands’ hand raising from there. The boy smiles, probably because the man is still alive, although is not clear what will be of him, I mean shot in both legs and with no eyes.. and he should have died too anyway, he wasn’t a good man at all. Badge or no badge.
El Mariachi gives his share of the money to the people of his village before going away.

The plot was too intricate for this kind of movie, it was really unnecessary and proved to be a point against it. Mendes is her usual self, very beautiful but a terrible actress. Depp was good, the best part of the movie. Hayek has a very very little part, only shown in flashback bits to show us how Marquez killed her. That was a shame, I like her a lot.
Enrique is definitely a better singer than he is an actor. Mickey Rourke was in an in-between phase, half-way through between what he looked like once and what he will look like after his face exploded.
El Mariachi, also called simply El - Antonio Banderas
Carolina - Salma Hayek
Sands - Johnny Depp
Barillo - Willem Defoe
Billy - Mickey Rourke
Ajedrez, the FBI agent who’s actually Barillo’s daughter - Eva Mendes
Cucuy - Danny Trejo
Lorenzp - Enrique Iglesias
Fideo - Marco Leonardi
Belini - Cheech Marin
Retired FBI agent Ramirez - Rubén Blades
ITA c’era una volta in Messico