Mexican Gangster (2008)

Directed by: Damian Chapa | 90 minutes | action | Actors: Damian Chapa, John Loretto, Tom Druilhet, Augustine Torres, Brienne De Beau, Monica Ramon, Stanley Griego, Bougart Linares, Sultria Demirjian, Christine Manoukian, Ricco Chapa, Amor Sanchez, Mauro Blanco, Pierre Chemaly, Curt Clendenin, Cyndye Doyle , Asad Farr, RJ Frost, Joshua Gill, Kayla Ginyard

Damian Chapa (1963) seems to be steering his film career in a certain direction with a firm hand. The actor who debuted in ‘Under Siege’ in 1992 starred in Taylor Hackford’s well-received ‘Blood In, Blood Out’ and added quite a few roles in B movies. Since the turn of the century, the actor has increasingly focused on writing, producing and directing feature films. He often assigns himself the leading role. Most remarkable are the biopic-like films that he has been involved in since 200: for example, he takes on the role of Roman Polanski in the horrendous ‘Polanski: Unauthorized’, written, produced and directed by himself and in the same year he kept himself filming ‘Bobby Fischer Live’: a fictional portrait of chess player Bobby Fischer. As if that wasn’t enough, he also made a film about Marlon Brando in 2011. You guessed who’s going to play that part… Want to add a little extra? There is a rumor in the corridors that he is making a film about Fellini. In this he will take on the role of Mastroianni… ‘Mexican Gangster’ is said to be based on a true story, but you can safely take that with a large grain of salt.

Chapa plays the title role in ‘Mexican Gangster’, Johnny Sunshine. Thanks to a traumatic experience in his childhood (yawn) he grows up to be the man he is today: a forty+ drug dealer and smuggler. He has a number of loyal friends in his area and a few who cannot be trusted. As a result, a corrupt cop (are you asleep yet?) manages to frame him. Johnny turns into the bin. “No, Johnny doesn’t need a TV in the cell or pictures on the wall. I have enough pictures in my head.” Flashback to fifteen years earlier: we see Johnny as an eight-year-old boy (arithmetic is not one of Chapa’s strong points), who sees his mother (white trash trailer park type) lying stoned in the chair. She screeches as he takes her joint and moments later we see Johnny’s parents – his father has the words ‘Mexican Gangster’ tattooed on his back – being shot by a bunch of crooks. Johnny, well-bred as he is, immediately shoots off the private parts of one of them and runs to comfort his baby brother in a crib. One of the criminals approaches him armed, doubts whether he will pull the trigger, but does not. A decision that turns out to be everything: not just for Johnny’s life. Eight years later, the Mexican Gangster (now with an identical tattoo) is released and decides that he prefers the straight path over his old lifestyle for the sake of his younger brother.

Everything is substandard about this production. Even with very low expectations, the film manages to disappoint. Not only is the story devoid of all originality (dialogues, situations), the action scenes are poorly executed and more sleep-inducing than adrenaline-boosting. The acting is lousy and the camerawork is disgusting. It seems that the cameraman has done his best to portray the cast and sets as unfavorably as possible. Damian Chapa doesn’t even have the charisma of Steven Seagal’s minus Tom Doty’s (you’ll have to look it up), so having to watch his face a whole movie is a tough task. Ordinary. Not. To look.