Director- Alejandro Jodorowsky
Starring- Alejandro Jodorowsky, Robert John, Mara Lorenzio
Gunfight el Topo (Jodorowsky) makes his way through a desert with his naked son seeking some kind of enlightenment. What that enlightenment is, exactly, I think is mostly known to the director/star himself.
The movie begins with the pair coming upon a village recently massacred. Bodies litter the streets and buildings, blood is puddled everywhere, and the one still-living inhabitant they find begs for death, a somber task el Topo leaves for his young son as a "life lesson".
Moving on, they take on a small group of bandits, then happen upon a group of monks being terrorized by more bandits, who are soon dealt with. El Topo leaves his son behind with the monks, and takes with him a woman who was being kept there "(Lorenzio)--he eventually names her Mara.
Being forced to prove his love for her, el Topo embarks on a mission to seek out four master gunfighters and best them in battle. The first is a blind guru who takes a shot to the head. The second is a gypsy who makes copper trinkets as a hobby. The third is a crackshot rabbit herder (yeah, you read it right) whose one-shot pistol and excellent aim ironically prove his undoing. The fourth no longer cares for gunfighting, and deprives el Topo of his victory by taking his own life--to prove how meaningless it is.
After he's accomplished the harrowing task, a cowgirl dressed in black (who decided to accompany them following the first major gunfight) shoots him up and leaves with Mara. A group of deformed underground dwellers find him and take him in. Somehow he survives the wounds, develops light hair, and decides to help the underground dwellers by digging a tunnel out, so everyone can live above ground with normal society.
He is accompanied in his dig by a little woman who eventually becomes his wife. He also runs into his son, who harbors some serious ill will for having left him so many years before (I can only guess he spent a lot of time underground). He agrees to put off killing el Topo until the tunnel is finished, even helping dig himself.
After all is finished, he finds he can't kill his own father and heads back into the nearby town. Meanwhile, all the deformed underground dwellers become overly excited about their new exit door and all leave at once. They are met at the outskirts of the nearby town by the paranoid townspeople, who subsequently open fire on them. El Topo makes it in time to see the last one fall, and is then shot down as well. His little wife, who has just given birth, takes off with his grown son, and that's that.
This movie, though confusing, kept my interest for the entire two hours, something that hasn't happened often with spaghetti westerns--at least, not since Django.
It is full of symbolism. The only hitch is that one must probably watch the movie a dozen times with some religious texts to try to catch what they can, or else contact Jodorowsky and ask him directly. I saw the obvious signs of hypocrisy and demented leadership, but never really got what el Topo was looking for all this time. Perhaps it was simple "enlightenment", maybe just a better home.
A strange midnight movie, to be sure, and an entertaining one, if for nothing else than the weirdness.
Rating: 3.5/5 Bonedaddies
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