Machete Kills (2013)

Rating: 4/5

In now-standard Rodriguez format, Machete Kills opens with a fake 'Coming Soon' trailer advertising something even more bizarre than what we're about to watch. This trailer dangles 'Machete Kills Again...In Space' under our noses, and with several big names and 30 seconds of ass-kickery, all good fans are ready and raring to go. Machete Kills Again is due next year. Awesome.

Machete Cortez, the most irresistible, invincible, incredible Mexican action hero ever, goes back a long way in the mind of writer-director Robert Rodriguez. When the auteur first met former gangster badman turned actor Danny Trejo, he was struck by his grilling presence, and decided early on that one day, Trejo would play Machete. This came partially to fruition in Spy Kids, in which Trejo played the uncle Machete - an inventor of cool spy gadgets - of the titular characters. But when another of Rodriguez's fake trailers introduced this Machete Cortez at the beginning of Planet Terror, fans went wild and Trejo finally got to play the role he was born for.

The original Machete was an insatiable, cartoonish explosion of satirical characters, wicked visuals and fabulous casting, featuring some of Rodriguez's best-loved regulars, as well as surprising appearances by Robert DeNiro and Lindsay Lohan. But Machete Kills is an absolute smorgasbord of the industry's finest. Here's a brief synopsis with all big names inserted:

Machete (always pronounced 'Ma-CHEY-tey) is renowned for being an unstoppable badass, so when bi-polar villain Mendez has a nuclear missile detonator hooked up to his own heart, the President of the United States ('Introducing' Carlos Estevez - winning!) asks Machete to go save the world, and earn his visa in return. Another criminal mastermind (Mel bloody Gibson) is battling to stop Machete stopping Mendez. On his side, Machete has the incontestable bad-ass chick Luz (Michelle Rodriguez), who having been so hard as to get back up after a bullet to the eye in the first movie, goes to whole new levels here, eventually requiring another eye patch.

On their tail is a string of pursuers - most of them sexy and leather-clad - chasing a bounty on Machete's head. There is the staff force of a brothel which includes an all-grown-up Alexa Vega from Spy Kids and Sophia Vergara from My Name Is Earl; and a mystical stalker named El Chameleon, whose various guises are played amusingly by Walton Goggins, Cuba Gooding Jr., Lady Gaga (yes, Lady Gaga), and the ever-gorgeous Antonio Banderas, respectively.

Machete Kills is deliciously Rodriguez, in all its flashy, bloody glory. We are treated to bountiful demonstrations of our hero's invincibility, such as using himself to conduct electricity from a fusebox to kill a guy he's grabbed hold of. I am of the habit of finding a lot of action movies dull, repetitive, cliché and ridiculously unentertaining. However, Rodriguez's wild, vibrant style and fresh perspective offer up a truly fun-to-watch piece of cinema, with characters we really root for with enthusiasm.

Between them, Rodriguez and Trejo have created an icon of the genre. Machete's long, stringy hair, furrowed brow and deep facial scars reflect the past bare-knuckled survivals, and unstoppable drive for more action that lurks in the parallel lives of Trejo and his alter ego. Despite his unbreakable surface and hardman persona, we totally love him. He's dangerously endearing, and we could watch him for years. I certainly hope to. Perhaps the year after next we will be eagerly snapping up tickets to Machete Kills Again In Space With A Time Machine.