Once Upon a Time in Mexico (2003) on Netflix
R20031h 42mActionCrimeThriller
CIA officer Sheldon Sands recruits El Mariachi to kill General Emiliano Marquez, who killed his wife and daughter in an ambush. Drug lord Armando Barillo wants Mexico's president dead.
- Netflix3.4/5
- IMDb6.3/10177,624 votes
- Rotten Tomatoes66%
Trailer
Plot summary
In Culiacán, drug lord Armando Barillo has hired General Emiliano Marquez to kill the President of Mexico and seize power. Marquez is also the man El Mariachi blames for the ambush that killed his wife Carolina and their daughter. CIA officer Sheldon Sands recruits El Mariachi to kill the general, and brings retired FBI agent Jorge Ramírez back to go after Barillo, who murdered his partner Archuleta. The operative Ajedrez is assigned to follow Barillo. Watching Barillo's operation, Ramírez meets Billy Chambers, an American fugitive sheltered by the drug lord who can no longer carry out the tasks he is given.
Cast
Did you know?!Facts and trivia about Once Upon a Time in Mexico (2003)
Can contain spoilers, watch the movie first.
- It was the first big-budget feature shot on high-definition digital video. Robert Rodriguez switched after George Lucas showed him early digital footage from Star Wars: Episode II, though he knew there was no time to shoot Spy Kids 2 that way.
- Rodriguez pushed the film ahead of both Spy Kids sequels, shooting it in May 2001 to get in before a threatened Screen Actors Guild strike, over seven weeks in Queretaro, San Miguel de Allende and Guanajuato.
- Rodriguez pitched the Desperado sequel to Miramax and wrote it in six days. The first draft ran only 65 pages, so he padded it with a subplot lifted from an unproduced short film of his, then cut it straight back out when Miramax hesitated.
- Rodriguez asked each leading actor for four or eight notes of melody for their character. Johnny Depp came back with a finished piece, which became track nine, "Sands Theme", credited to Tonto's Giant Nuts.
- Johnny Depp built CIA man Sands on a charming Hollywood operator he had known, a soft-spoken man who always called him John rather than Johnny and who, Depp knew, was planning to cheat him.
