El Topo

if you want your mind blown, indulge. maybe not fit for obligates.

I saw this film in a theater in Europe, in the 1970s and its classification as an Acid Western, portraying a counter culture dream through drug induced hallucinations, summed it up well. Alejandro Jodorowsky stalked critics of this film with admissions of criminal behavior and later denials. Hollywood did well by not allowing his Dune to be filmed.

I ate something and 30 minutes in I couldn’t stop laughing. Probably more enjoyable after eating something.

This review is not speaking the quality of the film. All spoken dialog is Spanish and the English subtitles are out of sync by at least 7 seconds so youre seeing subtitles before characters have even spoken and by the time the actor says the line the subtitles are gone.

El Topo is a fil I had read and heard a lot about and decided to see someday. I found it available for rent on Amazon Prime and viewed it after 35 years of curiousity. There was a problem I discovered right away. The movie was neither dubbed NOR SUBTITLED although it was specified to be subtitled in English. I speak and understand very little Spanish, ie I can read a menu and exchange very basic pleasantries and thats about it. This could have been a real problem, if the storyline had not been so simple and sketchy that my partner and I could both follow it without understanding dialog. The fact that I have read a lot about El Topo already also helped me understand what was going on. iBut it was SUPPOSED TO BE SUBTITLED and there were some talkier parts where I would really have liked to have had those subtitles, to know what was being said in the talkier part. Otherwise I wasnt overly impressed. The protagonist looks like a Berkeley drug casualty for the first two-thirds of the film and you could see how the ending was going to go ten minutes before it got there. Its all photographed beautifully and the surrealistic visual aspects are startling and fascinating, but I liked Senor Jodorowskis other films, THE HOLY MOUNTAIN and SANTA SANGRE, much better than this one.

Were always a good time. I missed this one and had to watch it. John Waters has the honor of the my original first Midnight Movie with Pink Flamingos and I have the ability to appreciate those cult movies from the seventies. I have seen Hairspray so many times its almost memorized. Ill never forget John Waters. Divine is a Saint. RIP Glen.

This is an art film and is renowned as a part of film history. Its very strange, spastic, and atmospheric. Movie deals with themes over direct story telling. Now the elephant in the room. The beginning of the movie has a naked kid in it. In a non sexual context, i guess its suppose to represent innocence and vulnerability. Regardless, it was offputting.

Oddest western I have ever seen.

I had a dream! He must have been one of the people there (so was David Lynch -- you can guess why!). It was in a past life ... there were five of us who should have been there, the sixth, lets just say he was immensely pleased. You can see this in the beginning of the movie. People strung up like for entertainment ... ripped open like fresh bread (hey! Spalding Grey must have been another) and tossed around for *sheer inventiveness* ... every time you turned a corner, there was another horror. After a certain point, you stopped saying anything and just gestured as though you could nod your head to point at it (except for the happy-about-it-guy). Im surprised Jodorowsky got so much of it out of his memory. It was like it was left for us, except it couldnt have been the case, because he just turned a corner and happened on it ... within days. It went beyond ritual, beyond gain of lucre, to sheer *inventiveness*. Rib cages broken open like piano kids, kids in front of their parents, stuff that obviously took a *long time* ... who would do this? All we could do is throw our hands up and drop it (except for the happy-go-lucky guy). It was weird, and the smell was terrible ... as people know, considerations about vegetarianism aside (or *included*), whatever offal from pigs or cows smells like, when people have been slaughtered, it just smells *bad* and *wrong* and *awful* ... Who could do this? We could barely get our minds around this, and it echoed with us -- for lifetimes. (Except the happy-go-lucky guy -- hey, maybe another one was Ioan Grillo, author of El Narco! Hes pretty stalwart, and that would fit). The she would had to wait on the boat wasnt too pleased at first, but when we came back with those looks in our eyes, she gathered it was at least for a reason ... better than we could have imagined when we left her on the ship, out of caution ... (hey! I think she works at Movie Madness now!). Suffice it to say, the film grasps that the tendency towards ambition also puts you in the tendency towards self-destruction; that to honor beauty and exalt, also has in it hidden the tendency to betray, to shatter for no good reason. A very wise film! And eye-opened about the indigenous peoples. Remember, it came out after Sam Peckinpahs The Wild Bunch, and we know how *that* one goes: The people with the guns, who can *afford* them (or *cannons*, or what-have-you ... ), like to shoot them because ultimately ... its *fun*. (Try not to get in their way! Amen.) Thanks, Alejandro!

I enjoyed Santa Sangre, but couldnt watch this film. Animals are abused during the making of this film. Even the ones that arent killed arent treated very nicely.