"Misterio en las Bermudas" (1979) d/ Gilbert Martin

By 1979, it's safe to say the lemon that once was the phenomenon of Mexican lucha libre movies had been squeezed of nearly every drop of entertaining juice, and tonight's review, known as Mystery in the Bermuda Triangle en ingles, is a brittle, dialed-in epitaph for the zany genre, bereaft of any real thrills. El Enmascarado de Plata, or Santo, as he was known worldwide, was already sixty-two years old(!) here, and though he would make four more wrestling movies before his death in 1984, the writing was already clearly on the wall.


"A thousand masks and you haven't got one condom?"
After a plane vanishes from sight during a tropical storm caused by a mirrored periscope of sorts, two Mexican anglers snag the mask of Santo from the rippling surf, leading one of the fishermen to tell the not-that-amazing tale that led up to this event. We see Santo, The Blue Demon, and Mil Mascaras dust off some ham n' egg opponents in a brief triple tag team match before they're asked by the government to go undercover to protect an Iranian karate-princess while she signs an important treaty. What's undercover for three guys in masks whipping around in convertible sports cars and stretch Cadillacs, I ask you. On the evil, scheming side of the peso, is an egghead assassin who's enlisted a trio of Mexican Mata Hari's to seduce valuable information out of the wrestlers/super heroes/special agents. He's also hired some thugs to rough up Mil Mascaras on a pier, and jack his wristwatch. What a bastard.


"As if you couldn't tell by the matching silver lame' headbands and jumpsuits, we're from an underwater city..."
Our heroes have a sloppily choreographed scrap or two with the egghead's beefy henchmen, save a drowning countryman from grainy stock footage of a shark, have a pair of uninspired car chases (and a boat chase) that show off their flash vehicles (and motorboat), and sit around sipping champagne in their best leisure wear (and color-coordinated maskies, of course). Santo's sympathetic spy-girl, Rina (Silvia Manriquez), is kidnapped by a pair of humps in silver lame' jumpsuits and taken to an unnamed city under the ocean, which has it's own sun, grass, and luxurious hotel, apparently. There, after being purified (by standing in a fountain in a bikini, mind you), she is reunited with her scientist father, who informs her she will never dwell among the surface folk again. In the end, they rescue the princess, but are transported off-camera to the underwater city, leading to the inevitable nuclear apocalypse that will no doubt occur in a Lucha Libre-less world, as evidenced by footage of a stock mushroom cloud. Could this really be the end???


"Which one of you high school gymnasium assassins has Mil's action slacks?"
If you set out to see every single Lucha Libre movie as a weird goal for yourself, I suppose you'd probably want to add this one to your list. Compared to earlier efforts, though, this one is flatter than the sounds coming out of a seventh grade marching band practice. The two stories barely intersect (or make sense, really), and the usual rough n' tumble action you might expect from one of these things is phoned in and lifeless. Notably, Mil Mascaras appears on camera momentarily without a mask on...from behind. Wah wah wah wahhhhh. You'll be blowing sad trombones of your own throughout this mess, which only manages a single Wop on the rating scale, a thrown match if there ever was one. Avoid.


"After this mission, we should become masked Chartered Accountants..."

"El Robo de las Momias de Guanajuato" (1972) d/ Tito Novaro

As a kid, I'd usually follow up my Saturday afternoon horror movie double dip with  WPHL-17 Philadelphia's own late, great horror host Dr. Shock with some WWF wrestling over dinner, and my favorite was always Mil Mascaras, hands down, with his high flying Mexican Lucha Libre maneuvers and colorful masks; a far cry from the usual cadre of lumpy, middle-aged palookas with broken noses and cauliflower ears slapping each other in the chest for twenty minutes. While Mil, or "Thousand Masks", was my favorite wrestler, he's never been one of my favorite actors. Tonight's review, known in English as "Robbery of the Guanajuato Mummies",  is another solid piece of evidence of why that is.


"Wait, was this the thousandth mask or the fifth or sixth one? I lost count, dammit!"
Count Cagliostro (Tito Novaro, the director himself) makes the scene in a carriage drawn by an animated skeleton with a scythe. At Dr. Raymond's futuristic silver-themed pad, they map out their plans for world domination: Mine an element that's "stronger than Uranium" out of a nearby abandoned silver mine, but not by putting the scientist's hired midget henchmen(!) at risk of radiation poisoning, but by stealing the mummies of Guanajuato, reanimating them through a forgotten Egyptian rite(!!), and forcing them to do the duo's dirty work. Only, a shoe shining peasant boy witnesses the robbery, and when the authorities naturally dismiss the boy's wild story, his grown up hobo sidekick suggests that they take the matter to his compadre, Thousand Masks. After thumping some lower tier humps in a lengthy tag team match with his pals, Rayo de Jalisco and Blue Angel (Santo and the Blue Demon must have been preoccupied with Dracula, the Wolfman, and the guy with a spider for a hand somewhere across town), Mil hears the transient's story as he's getting a rub down from some groovy seventies dish and totally buys it. This sounds like a job for some masked wrestlers.


"Of course, I'm a top scientist, can't you see all the silver things in here?"
After entirely too long, Mil and his cape-wearing sidekicks-on-motorcycles (Mil whips a flash convertible full of groupie birds like a pugilistic pimp in a leopard print bomber jacket, for the record) descend upon Cagliostro and Raymond's shiny hideout, on a heroic sabbatical from sold out wrestling matches and the fitness workshop for mini-skirted chicks that they run on the side, these fuckin' guys! Though "The Lightning from Jalisco" experiences great difficulty executing his trademark diving headbutt to oncoming attacking midgets, and Blue Angel (looks more like "Cap'n South America" to me) is similarly inept duking it out versus the mummies, Thousand Masks throws on his ornate cape and proves more than able enough in defeating all manner of baddies with flying dropkicks and submission holds par excellence, culminating in total destruction of the witchcraft/science alliance (don't expect any Michael Bay-style pyrotechnics here, whatever you do), and our heroes drive off into the sunset, until the next time their beloved Mexico is threatened by the forces of evil...


In a low budget movie, a brush fire on a hill like this one could only mean the day has been once again saved.
Mascaras, who's made twenty or so of these wrestling movies since his inception in the late sixties as a replacement of sorts to El Santo and the Blue Demon on the silver screen, was inducted into the Professional Wrestling Hall of Fame in 2010 and the WWE Hall of Fame two years later. All of that aside, it still doesn't excuse such a meretricious cinematic taco of stinkamole as this, with a story that'd insult the average four year old's intelligence. In other words, great fun to shred on with your snarky film chums over a well-packed bubbler. On the scale though, El Robo gets headstand-headscissored into a one count, and angry fans throw milk cartons towards the squared circle...


"How you chicks feel about the Burger Chef drive thru?"