When Robert Rodriguez first conceived of El Mariachi, he intended to release the film direct to the Spanish video market. By his account, he really did not expect the film to be successful, at least not in the way that it was. His intention was to make it a trilogy, using the three films to practice his filmmaking. To his purported surprise, the film became wildly successful. When columbia initially picked up the distribution rights there was discussion on wether or not the film should be remade with a larger budget with Antonio Banderas starring as the guitar player. Columbia eventually decided they wanted to cash in quick and release the original version of El Mariachi as well as make a Hollywood film using the same character.
Eventually Rodriguez would go on to complete his trilogy. It becomes an interesting study of film making because each film would have a bigger budget, but through it all Rodriguez maintained his steadfast adherence to maximizing his budget by staying cheap. Rodriguez made El Mariachi for $7,000 while trying to make it look like a $7 million dollar movie and Desperado while trying to make it look like a 30 million dollar movie. He finished off by making Once Upon a Time in Mexico for around 30 million.
Even though the movies get successively more expensive I Still always get the feeling the I am seeing more on the screen then was spent for the film. 30 million dollars is a lot of money but it is still relatively cheap for big budget hollywood action movies. Movies similar to Once Upon a Time in Mexico often spend between 50 and 60 million and don't look that much better or even different (at least to my eye) than that film.
Personally watching the films with the commentary or listening to Rodriguez's 10 minute School series provides a revealing example of the way the independent spirit of film making can be applied to Hollywood movies with results that are at once unique and refreshing AND familiar and digestible. Rodriguez ways of maximizing the budget is as much a style in and of itself and are the reasons that he is valuable to the art not just for his films but his ideas and theories of film making.
1 comment:
Rodriguez sure is an interesting film maker when you look at his career. Having seen all 3 films it is quite amazing to me to see the progression of each films style as well as their budgets. It is truly hard to believe that El Mariachi was made for only 7000 dollars. I still cant believe it. I first saw that film when I was a lot younger and unaware of the whole independent/Hollywood thing. I just thought that it looked a little amateurish that is all. Upon seeing the latest film Once Upon a Time in Mexico I can still see evidence, especially with his commentaries on the DVD, that Rodriguez still likes to save money and do things smarter not harder when making his films. Its actually sort of inspirational to know that there is someone out there making movies not with a huge budget in mind but with content and style in mind and if he can do it certainly more can.
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