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Released by: Rise Above Entertainment
Released on: 5/6/2003
Director: Hector Molinar
Cast: Hijo Del Santo!, Diana Golden, Turry Linar
Year: 2001
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The Movie:
I love Mexican Wrestling films. I really do. They're crazy, they don't always make sense, they're almost always ultra low budget and a lot of times they rip off other, more popular films. But I don't care about any of that. Put a guy in a wrestling mask on screen, give him some monsters or mad scientists to battle, and you've got my attention.
So when I found out that the first new Santo film in almost twenty years and starring the late wrestlers son as the new man in the silver mask was coming out on DVD, I was stoked and eagerly plopped it in the DVD player, glued my ass to my orange vinyl couch, and grabbed myself a cold tallboy of PBR in preparation.
The story isn't much different from many of the other lucha libre films made in the years past. It turns out that an international crime gang is wreaking havoc in Mexico and a string of abductions has been happening around town. It's up to Santo, who's hanging around in his secret hideout, to come to the aide of the Agency of National Security and find out what's going on.
When Santo begins investigating, he finds that a young boy named Diego may know more about these crimes than anyone else but Diego is kidnapped before he can enlighten Santo as to how is doing the kidnappings (they may or may not be space aliens) and why, so it's up to Santo to track him down and save him.
It's not a bad premise for this type of film. It could have worked. Santo's son fills his shiny silver boots quite admirably and throwing in The Blue Panther to help Santo on his mission was a nice touch. Unfortunately the film is mired by its poorhouse special effects. These are really bottom of the barrel here, even by wrestling movie standards. Most of them are bad digital video effects and they don't add anything to the film so much as they take away from it.
Overall, the film does have it's moments, but you should really only check this one out if you're wanting to complete your Santo DVD library or you're just too curious for your own good.
Video/Audio/Extras:
While there aren't any problems with the actual transfer on this release, there are some problems with the source material. Seeing as the film was shot on video with less than ideal lighting conditions and on an obviously very small budget, the movie is pretty dark and kind of muddy looking at times. With that out of the way, there aren't any compression issues or edge enhancement problems and it's never bad enough that you can't follow the action.
The film is presented in Dolby Digital Stereo in Spanish with optional English subtitles. Dialogue is relatively clear but at times it does get drowned out a little bit by the score and there is some background noise present in a few scenes. Most of the movie sounds fine, but there are a few scenes that sure could have sounded better. Luckily, especially for those of us who don't speak Spanish, the subtitles are nice and clear and easy to read though.
Rise Above has thrown a few goodies on this release for Lucha fanatics to sink their teeth into. First up are a handful of deleted scenes. These scenes play more like extended versions of the scenes used in the final cut of the film and were likely just trimmed for editing purposes rather than content. Next up are some outtakes, which I can't really comment too much on as there are no English subtitles available for them. There are also a few promotional spots that cover some behind the scenes stuff and also document the premiere of the film in Mexico. Next up is the Best Of El Santo clip that is also on a few of the other releases, and also an interview with the director, Hector Molinar (which features a great vintage clip of El Santo and the Blue Demon wrestling each other).
The Final Word:
While this isn't nearly as good as the earlier original Santo films, it works at least as a curiosity factor. Marginally recommended - but for Santo completists only, even if Rise Above did a decent technical job on this release.