Machete: Difference between revisions

Line 15:

* [[Absurdly Sharp Blade]]: Machete's... machetes, and the scalpels he later uses.

* [[Action Girl]]: Luz and Sartana. April in the end [[Took a Level In Badass]].

* [[Actor Allusion]]: Torrez, played by [[Steven Seagal]], describes Machete as "notoriously [[Hard to Kill~~|hard to kill~~]]". Torrez also uses an aikido move on Machete during their final confrontation.

* [[Actor Allusion]]: Torrez, played by [[Steven Seagal]], describes Machete as "notoriously [[Hard to Kill]]". Torrez also uses an aikido move on Machete during their final confrontation.

** [[Robert De Niro|Robert De Niro's]] line ''"It's showtime!"''

* [[Adam Westing]]: Lots and lots.

Line 56:

* [[Car Fu]] - Low-rider hydraulics have never been so lethal.

* [[Car Meets House]] - Several times.

* [[Caught On Tape]] - The villains commit so many criminal acts in front of video cameras that it borders on [[Too Dumb to Live]] territory. Heck, a Texas state senator, during an election year, actually ''requests'' that someone videotape him committing murder and burn a bunch of copies of the DVD.

* [[Caught on Tape]] - The villains commit so many criminal acts in front of video cameras that it borders on [[Too Dumb to Live]] territory. Heck, a Texas state senator, during an election year, actually ''requests'' that someone videotape him committing murder and burn a bunch of copies of the DVD.

* [[Chekhov's Gun]]:

** Booth is ironically the one who gave Machete the handphone ("Machete don't text") in the first place.

Line 62:

** At a safehouse hospital, a friendly doctor mentions how the human body has 60 feet of large intestines. Guess what Machete uses when he needs to make a quick exit out of that hospital's window?

* [[Completely Missing the Point]]/[[Does Not Understand Sarcasm|Does Not Understand Parody]]: A few "concerned" people thought this was a violent racist movie. Fortunately, the wank is [http://www.movieguide.org/articles/1/931 hilarious.] They didn't watch it, either, apparently, because, as below, {{spoiler|a Mexican is the real big bad.}}

* [[Contract On the Hitman]] - The whole plot.

* [[Contract on the Hitman]] - The whole plot.

* [[Creator Provincialism]]: The film is set in Austin, where Robert Rodriguez lives and his film studio is based.

* [[Crucified Hero Shot]]: With surprising attention to detail. Most depictions that even ''use'' nails will have them driven into the palms; this movie accurately shows the nails being driven into the wrist-joints.

Line 73:

* [[Defictionalization]]: It began its life as a fake trailer attached to ''[[Grindhouse]]''. Rodriguez was planning on making it a direct-to-DVD movie in the first place, however, but was eventually convinced to make it for theatrical release.

* [[Deleted Scene]]: {{spoiler|How did Machete get out of Torres' death trap that opened the movie?}}

** See the [[What Could Have Been~~|what could have been~~]] trope below.

** See the [[What Could Have Been]] trope below.

* [[Determinator]]: Machete has a bullet in his head and got shot in his shoulder. This won't stop him from [[Badass|kicking ass.]]

* [[Does This Remind You of Anything?]]: How did Machete's hit on McLaughlin go tits up? [[Who Shot JFK?|A second gunman was involved.]]

Line 108:

* [[Fake Nationality]]: [[Steven Seagal]] as a katana-wielding Mexican drug lord? That could work...

** [[Robert Rodriguez]] seems to have a fondness for this, as he acknowledged the on-purpose, over-the-top silliness of a spray-tanned Willem Dafoe playing a Mexican drug lord in the DVD commentary of ''[[Once Upon a Time In Mexico]]''

** One of Luz's Network crew is an [[Pretty Fly for A White Guy|adopted white kid who was raised Mexican]].

** One of Luz's Network crew is an [[Pretty Fly for a White Guy|adopted white kid who was raised Mexican]].

** {{spoiler|1=Senator McLaughlin isn't actually from Texas. His southern accent is totally fake. His real voice is simply [[Robert De Niro]] [[Adam Westing|talking normally]]. This is probably a reference to the fact that George W. Bush is actually from Connecticut.}}

* [[Faking the Dead]]: {{spoiler|Luz, comes back from the dead wearing an eyepatch and donning her old role as [[La Résistance|the rebel leader "Shé"]].}}

Line 114:

* [[Foreign Culture Fetish]]: Torrez, apparently, down to using a katana and committing seppuku.

* [[Gatling Good]]: Machete attaches a gatling gun to his motorcycle, then rides over an explosion from nowhere to shoot a mob of Mooks.

* [[Genre Savvy]]: The guards in black suits go through a [[Zig Zagging Trope|zig-zagging version of the trope]]. At first, they are [[Genre Blind]] enough to let in a [[Badass]]-looking Mexican with [[Improvised Weapon|sharp garden tools]], but quickly realize - and [[Lampshade]] - that they were suffering from [[Plot Induced Stupidity]]. When Machete pays a second visit, they are [[Genre Savvy]] enough to surrender to him, understanding his role as the [[Action Hero]] and theirs as [[Mooks|expendable goons]]. He's nice enough to let them live.

* [[Genre Savvy]]: The guards in black suits go through a [[Zig-Zagging Trope|zig-zagging version of the trope]]. At first, they are [[Genre Blind]] enough to let in a [[Badass]]-looking Mexican with [[Improvised Weapon|sharp garden tools]], but quickly realize - and [[Lampshade]] - that they were suffering from [[Plot Induced Stupidity]]. When Machete pays a second visit, they are [[Genre Savvy]] enough to surrender to him, understanding his role as the [[Action Hero]] and theirs as [[Mooks|expendable goons]]. He's nice enough to let them live.

* [[George Lucas Throwback]]: To '70s exploitation/trash movies, especially in the vein of blaxploitation movies.

* [[Godiva Hair]]: April, waking up in a church after having been fucked sensele... drugged by Machete. It doesn't always cover everything up.

Line 154:

* [[Karma Houdini]]:

** {{spoiler|Osiris, who disappears before the climax, due to his death scene getting left on the cutting room floor. Remnants of Von Jackon's vigilantes manage to escape and continue gunning down people they think are Mexicans. Torres' female sidekick just walks off.}}

** In a rare [[Zig Zagging Trope|Triple Subversion]], {{spoiler|1=McLaughlin. First he looks like he's going to escape disguised as a Mexican [after helping the Mexicans, strangely enough], but then April shoots him. Then he turns out to have survived thanks to a bulletproof vest, and flees on foot. But then he gets killed by Von Jackson's men, mistaking him for a Mexican.}}

** In a rare [[Zig-Zagging Trope|Triple Subversion]], {{spoiler|1=McLaughlin. First he looks like he's going to escape disguised as a Mexican [after helping the Mexicans, strangely enough], but then April shoots him. Then he turns out to have survived thanks to a bulletproof vest, and flees on foot. But then he gets killed by Von Jackson's men, mistaking him for a Mexican.}}

* [[Karmic Death]] / [[Hoist By His Own Petard]]: {{spoiler|1=McLaughlin - after putting on a Hispanic-looking outfit to escape the Big Final Shootout - is caught stumbling along the border fence by remnants of Von Jackson's army and shot down, falling into the electrified fence. McLaughlin even smiles as he dies, apparently appreciating the irony.}}

* [[Karmic Death]] / [[Hoist by His Own Petard]]: {{spoiler|1=McLaughlin - after putting on a Hispanic-looking outfit to escape the Big Final Shootout - is caught stumbling along the border fence by remnants of Von Jackson's army and shot down, falling into the electrified fence. McLaughlin even smiles as he dies, apparently appreciating the irony.}}

* [[Kavorka Man]]: Ladies ''love'' Machete.

** Considering the trailer insists "Machete gets the women," this [[You Can't Fight Fate|was unavoidable]].

Line 194:

** He looks when he fires, it's just that he first turns the rifle towards McLaughlin while still looking/smirking at Machete.

* [[Offstage Villainy]] - Torres' drug operations have been... expanding.

* [[Off ~~With~~ His Head]]: Machete decapitates a lot of people, including five guys with a single stroke in the opening scene.

* [[Off with His Head]]: Machete decapitates a lot of people, including five guys with a single stroke in the opening scene.

* [[Oh Crap]]:

** "You're telling me that Mexican day-laborer is a '''G*****N FEDERALE'''?!"

Line 216:

* [[Ramp Jump]]: An incredibly [[Egregious]] example at the climax of the movie: Machete mounts a [[Gatling Good|minigun]] onto a [[Cool Bike|chopper]], and ramps off of a part of the scenery with a [[Impressive Pyrotechnics|huge explosion]] behind him (with no apparent cause [[Rule of Cool|other than]] [[Awesomeness Is Volatile|it would be awesome]]), and cuts down a dozen mooks with gunfire before landing.

* [[Rated "M" for Manly]]: The movie is a homage to the [[Roaring Rampage of Revenge|avenging anti-hero]] movies of [[The Seventies]]. So it's got everything - guns, [[Machete Mayhem|machetes]], explosions, machetes, sexy women, [[Overly Long Gag|machetes]], and tequila - that made such movies so manly. And ''thankfully'' without the awful disco soundtracks. Well, besides the scene with Lohan. Oh, we forgot to mention it's a [[Grindhouse]] spinoff.

* [[Real Trailer Fake Movie]]: ''Machete'' started out as one of these.

* [[Real Trailer, Fake Movie]]: ''Machete'' started out as one of these.

* [[Reality Subtext]]: [[Lindsay Lohan]] as a drugged-out amateur porn star who's trying to have a legit career? ''Awkwaaard.'' But hilarious.

* [[Recycled in Space]]!: As of Comic Con 2011, the sequel Machete Kills Again has been retitled Machete Kills Again IN SPACE!

* [[Refuge in Cool]], [[Refuge in Audacity]], [[Rule of Cool]]: Take your pick.

** [[So Bad It's Good|Refuge In So Bad Its Good]]: every [[What Happened to ~~The~~ Mouse?|plot hole]], [[Special Effects Failure]], awful delivery, [[Flat Character|poorly defined character]] and [[Conspicuous CG]] only make it a better homage to the schlock that codified these tropes.

** [[So Bad It's Good|Refuge In So Bad Its Good]]: every [[What Happened to the Mouse?|plot hole]], [[Special Effects Failure]], awful delivery, [[Flat Character|poorly defined character]] and [[Conspicuous CG]] only make it a better homage to the schlock that codified these tropes.

* [[Retired Badass]]: Played straight with Padre. {{spoiler|Heavily implied with Luz.}}

{{quote| "I don't kill anymore." "You don't kill any ''less'', either."}}

* [[Right Man in ~~The~~ Wrong Place]]: The plot gets kicked off when Machete's framed for assassination of a racist senator - Booth has no idea he just hired the wrong Mexican.

* [[Right Man in the Wrong Place]]: The plot gets kicked off when Machete's framed for assassination of a racist senator - Booth has no idea he just hired the wrong Mexican.

* [[Right-Wing Militia Fanatic]]: Von Jackson and his border vigilantes.

* [[Roaring Rampage of Revenge]]: They DID, after all, just fuck with the wrong Mexican...

Line 232:

** Torres saying "puñeta" every time he shows up. It's, sadly, a practically untranslatable Spanish curse word (the closest it can be translated to is "jerking off" used as an exclamation or adjective), [[Bilingual Bonus|but to any person familiar with Spanish, it's rolling-on-the-floor funny.]]

* [[The Savage South]]: insane Mexican mercenary runs amok in Texas.

* [[Screw the ~~Rules, I'm Doing What's Right|Screw The~~ Rules, I'm Doing What's Right]]: When Sartana gets pulled off the case, she decides to deliver all the evidence she has acquired from Machete to a news reporter.

* [[Screw the Rules, I'm Doing What's Right]]: When Sartana gets pulled off the case, she decides to deliver all the evidence she has acquired from Machete to a news reporter.

{{quote| "Well, [[To Be Lawful or Good|there's the law and there's what's right]]. [[Crowning Moment of Awesome|I'm gonna do what's right]]."}}

* [[Screw This, I'm Outta Here]]: Upon encountering Machete ''again'' after getting getting shot in the legs during Machete's escape from the framing, a mook [[Know When to Fold'Em|immediately quits angrily.]]

Line 239:

* [[Sir Not-Appearing-In-This-Trailer]]: Jeff Fahey was barely in the trialer and did not appear on a lot of promotional material, despite having more screen time than De Niro and Seagal.

* [[Shout-Out]]:

** In the original ''Grindhouse'' trailer, Machete is seen inspecting a table full of weapons while [[John Carpenter]]'s synthesizer score from ''[[Escape ~~From~~ New York]]'' plays, imitating a scene from that film.

** In the original ''Grindhouse'' trailer, Machete is seen inspecting a table full of weapons while [[John Carpenter]]'s synthesizer score from ''[[Escape from New York]]'' plays, imitating a scene from that film.

** And the wide shot of the four bad guys walking into the church seems to echo the DiVAS entering the church in ''[[Kill Bill]]''

** {{spoiler|Luz}} in an eyepatch and stepping out of an ambulance covered in leather could homages Elle Driver and/or Snake Plissken.

Line 262:

* [[Stylistic Suck]] - This being a [[Grindhouse]] spinoff and parody... you can tell Rodriguez was aiming to fill the movie to the brim with cheesy special effects and intentional [[Fridge Logic]]. For example, a lot of the effects are obviously intentionally half-assed or done wrong.

* [[Take That]]: A ''Cinco De Mayo''-themed trailer was issued with "A [http://popwatch.ew.com/2010/05/05/machete-trailer-lohan/ special message]... to ARIZONA!" In response to an anti-illegal-immigrant law (SB 1070) that had just passed in that state.

* [[Taking You ~~With~~ Me]]: {{spoiler|Torres}} considers this as he's dying...

* [[Taking You with Me]]: {{spoiler|Torres}} considers this as he's dying...

{{quote| ''"...But you'll probably be in Hell waiting for me."''}}

* [[Technical Pacifist]]: Machete, believe it or not. Sure, he kills ''a lot'' of people, but he goes out of his way to take out a lot through nonlethal means. Note the group of [[Mooks]] who live to encounter him a second time - only to survive again.

Line 272:

* [[Throw It In]]: Apparently the awesome line "Machete don't text" arose from a real-life communication between [[Danny Trejo]] and [[Robert Rodriguez]]

* [[Throwing Your Sword Always Works|Throwing Your Machete Always Works]]: In this movie, ''it does.''

* [['Tis Only a Bullet In ~~The~~ Brain]]: Machete and Luz both survive a bullet in the brain unscathed (well... minus an eye in Luz's case but it doesn't seem to cause her much trouble.)

* [['Tis Only a Bullet in the Brain]]: Machete and Luz both survive a bullet in the brain unscathed (well... minus an eye in Luz's case but it doesn't seem to cause her much trouble.)

** Machete actually survived two. The first bullet saved his life by stopping the second bullet's advance.

* [[Trailers Always Spoil]]: Anyone who's seen the trailer (or even just the opening credits) will know that Luz survives losing her eye and gets a patch.

Line 291:

** The deleted scenes contain several. Sartana had a slutty twin sister constantly whacked out on Ny Quil that also lived with her, and they also greatly disliked each other - {{spoiler|she is later murdered by one of Osiris' partners who also didn't make it into the film, followed up by a scene of Sartana finding her body and showing she really did care about her}}; Osiris had another female partner named Boots McCoy (complete with her own title card introduction), who seemed to be quite crazy {{spoiler|originally she was the one to shoot Luz in the eye (by using a live cat as a silencer no less) instead of Von Jackson, and she also kills Sartana's twin sister by slitting her throat with a razor blade in her mouth}}; Osiris' fate, detailed below; Sartana questions Senator McLaughlin and Booth in the hospital about the assassination attempt; and scene of the Senator being interviewed by the latina reporter at the station. There's always Machete Kills...

** Chris Cooper was the first choice for the Senator McLaughlin role. He turned it down as he thought the script was too weird.

* [[What Happened to ~~The~~ Mouse?]]: [[Career Killers|Osiris]] disappears before the climax, without getting killed or finishing his job. In one of his later scenes, he notes that Machete isn't looking for ''him'', implying that he simply quit. He was originally supposed to get caught scoping out the chop shop and get decapitated by a power saw, but the scene was deleted.

* [[What Happened to the Mouse?]]: [[Career Killers|Osiris]] disappears before the climax, without getting killed or finishing his job. In one of his later scenes, he notes that Machete isn't looking for ''him'', implying that he simply quit. He was originally supposed to get caught scoping out the chop shop and get decapitated by a power saw, but the scene was deleted.

* [[When All You Have Is a Hammer]]: the white kid's buddy is an artist who draws perfect portraits of Sartana and Machete. What does he do in the final fight, when the nurses, Wrench Wenches and dishwashers are all packing heat? Just... run around sketching like mad, apparently.

* [[Wilhelm Scream]]: One of the border vigilantes emits one in the climax before [[Car Fu|being squashed by a hydraulics-hopping lowrider]].

Line 297:

* [[World of Ham]]: Machete ''is'' the page summary for this trope.

* [[Would Not Shoot a Good Guy]]: Machete spares the lives of Booth's guards, who only had an extremely vague clue as to what their boss was getting up to. Also, when he is "arrested" by phony cops, he waits until he hears them admit that they're fake before killing them.

* [[Writer On Board]]: Played for laughs and invoked. Rodriguez does, apparently, mean the film's pro-immigration stance sincerely, but he also portrays the conflict as not even really about race, but about money, with a Mexican drug lord as one of the main villains, and turns up the [[Narm]] and [[Anvilicious|anviliciousness]] up, since it ''is'' meant to be a throwback to stupid race exploitation films.

* [[Writer on Board]]: Played for laughs and invoked. Rodriguez does, apparently, mean the film's pro-immigration stance sincerely, but he also portrays the conflict as not even really about race, but about money, with a Mexican drug lord as one of the main villains, and turns up the [[Narm]] and [[Anvilicious|anviliciousness]] up, since it ''is'' meant to be a throwback to stupid race exploitation films.

* [[You Have Failed Me]]: Torres, Booth, McLaughlin, and Von Jackson don't like it when their underlings make too many mistakes. {{spoiler|1=They even start turning on ''each other'' when their more monstrous actions go public, Booth getting killed and Von Jackson about to execute McLaughlin.}}

* [[You Have Outlived Your Usefulness]] - {{spoiler|All the bad guys to each other when Machete ruins their plans, ''again''}}