The Boston Globe from Boston, Massachusetts • 54

Rodriguez's $7,000 wonder 'Splitting Heirs': A no-brainer with plenty of laugfis By Jay Carr GLOBE STAFF By Jay Carr GLOBE STAFF EL MARIACHI Directed by: Robert Rodriguez Screenplay by: Rodriguez, Carbs Gallardo Starring: Gallardo, Conmtelo Gomez, Reinoi Martinez, Peter Marquardt Playing at: in Spanish (subtitles) Rated: (strong violence) I I ''tut I 1 iff- 377 I Robert Rodriguez's "El Maria-chi" is the kind of film that has become a legend less for what it is than MtuSa wna cos $7,000. Intended Review by Rodriguez as his calling card, it proved good enough to play in theaters on its own. You can see why. Although crude, it deftly balances kinetic action sequences with hip awareness, only occasionally succumbing to moves that seem self-conscious or affected, such as needless slo-mo, fish-eye lenses or dream sequences. Looking at its story of a vagrant guitarist who wanders into a lethal Mexican town, is taken in by a femmefatale saloonkeeper and mistaken for a professional hit man who dresses similarly and carries his arsenal in a similar guitar case, you'll be pleasantly surprised by its momentum and by the spin Rodriguez puts on the story's standard ingredients.

Although the film's hand-held origins are apparent, he brings finesse and resourcefulness to the film shot in the Mexican border town of Acuna, conveying both a sense of reassuring familiarity with genre convention and finesse enough to bring off a fast-moving Sergio George Miller parody filtered through Latino noir. Shrewdly, he remains distanced from the plot cliches, thus encouraging us to do the same, the better to enjoy his send-ups that begin when the local drug "Splitting Heirs" is an amiable little no-brainer that you'll be ashamed of laughing at as often as Movie I d0- MpIaf like a Monty KeVieW Python cross be-: tween "The Jerk" and "King Ralph" as Python veteran Eric Idle, a commoner oblivious to the fact that he doesn't exactly match up with the Indian family of London shopkeepers he thinks he's been one of since infancy, is elevated to royalty and riches. Or, rather, he would be if he didn't think it impolite to bring up the fact that he's the real heir since the unwitting one, played by Rick Moranis, has treated him very nicely, saving his job in the family firm and elevating him to the exalted status of drinking buddy. Moranis plays a breezy American, the better to dish out irreverent cracks about Brits, as the Kevin Kline character did in "A Fish Called Wanda," but more softly, describing his late father, for instance, as uptight and emotionally dead like all Brits. The '60s prologue, in which the baby and heir is left behind in an Indian restaurant by his spacy parents, is the sort of giddy, silly vignette in which all the Python alumni have been thoroughy schooled.

And speaking of Python alums and "A Fish Called Wanda," John Cleese is a big help as a figure of manic denial, a greedy barrister who refuses to hear that Idle doesn't want to hire him as a freelance assassin so Idle SI I I kingpin hears that his men are being mowed down by a killer in black and the druglord's gun-toting gang assumes that the innocent musician is the guy. The action and dispatching of the gang members is handled with verve and panache, although a violent climax lands more heavily than the semi-spoofing that had gone before. Rodriguez has an easy rapport with his actors, too. Carlos Gallardo, who helped Rodriguez write and produce the film, uses uneasiness to make the mariachi watchable through all the chase scenes, including the ones in which he gets improbably lucky. Consuelo Martin turns in a fresh yet worldly performance as the woman and Reinoi Martinez is amusing as the blocky, relentless heavy.

Mostly, though, it's Rodriguez's stylish hand and his ability to maintain momentum that keep the film going. It won't do to build "El Mariachi" up as more than it is. The inevitable Hollywood remake doubtless will do that But there's enough entertainment value, underdog appeal and sheer vigor here to catch and hold anyone's eye. You don't have to be an executive to like "El Mariachi." minmmmmmm Rick Moranis and Eric Idle in a scene from "Splitting Heirs." FROM THE DIRECTOR OF 'EUROPA EUROPA' "FASCINATING" i CTJIDTI lUniV DDMTMlUn winn i Liuuu nur uun a film of uncommon wisdom, delicacy and humor." vimiivM mu vim utuvubi "ONE Of THE BEST FILMS Of 1993 -LnrHC FmcriU, BS mtUZINt A FEAT OF STORYTELLING VIRTUOSITY" MSMaMffl brims over with humor and heartbreak." Of all the films that have wasted Barbara Hershey in recent years, this one wastes her most as the heir's nymphomaniac stepmother. STOKE can work his way up the succession and Cleese can prosper.

Until they run the joke into the ground, it's pretty funny whenever Idle denounces Cleese and tries to chase him away only to have Cleese wink in complicity and congratulate him for his cleverness in refusing to reveal any connection between them in public. Actually, we laugh at Cleese long before we see him when the credits say "Introducing John Cleese." The truth is that "Splitting Heirs" can't sustain its one-joke premise. Its sex jokes bisexual every time I want sex I have to buy are on a level with all those dumb trousers-dropping farces that run in the West End for years, at- SPLITTING HEIRS t. Directed by: Robert Young Screenplay by: Eric Idle Starring: Idle, Rick Moranis, Barbara' Hershey, John Cleese, Catherine Jones, Sadie Frost, Stratford Johns, Brenda Bruce Playing at: Copley Place, suburbs Rated: PG-13 (nudity, sexual dialogue) Broadway. And of all the films that have wasted Barbara Hershey in recent years, this one wastes her most as the heir's nymphomaniac stepmother.

I can assure you that "Splitting Heirs" has no socially redeeming value or any other value but it does have the odd giggle. the last days "one of best films. Fnpam vnnr mind ana heart rno7 nnnc maw nun Ul Ul IUC IIUUU LOEWS Daily Frit Sit lit tfKMlHKMM HARVARD SQ. BRATTLE THEATRE 40 BRATTLE STREET CAMB. 876-6837 OPENS TODAY! EXCLUSIVE ENGAGEMENT! TWO WEEKS ONLY 4:00, 6:00, 8:00, 10:00 (Sat.

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