Nacho Libre - Preview
Preview by Jack Foley
ON PAPER, it looks like a meeting of comic minds that couldn’t possibly fail – Jack Black, the talented star of past hits School of Rock and High Fidelity, with Jared Hess, director of indie comic hit, Napoleon Dynamite.
If word from America is anything to go by, however, the resulting comedy isn’t nearly as funny as early word or its trailer suggests.
Jack Black plays Nacho, a man without skills. After growing up in a Mexican monastery, he’s now a grown man and the monastery’s cook, but doesn’t seem to fit in.
Nacho cares deeply for the orphans he feeds, but his food is terrible and he soon comes to realise that he must hatch a plan to make money to buy better food them. So he becomes a Lucha Libre wrestler and discovers a natural, raw talent for wrestling.
As he teams with his rail-thin, unconventional partner, Esqueleto (the Skeleton), Nacho feels for the first time in his life that he has something to fight for and a place where he belongs.
But as Lucha is strictly forbidden by the church elders at the monastery, Nacho is forced to lead a double life and disguises himself with a sky blue mask to take on Mexico’s most famous wrestlers and make life a little sweeter at the orphanage.
Nacho Libre is loosely based on the story of Fray Tormenta, or Friar Storm, who enjoyed a career lasting 23 years and 4,000 bouts. But while the real-life story contained some fairly dramatic twists, both Black and Hess found it inhibited the comedy and so followed a different path.
The ensuing film looks to have found Black one of his most outrageous roles yet – especially when called upon to wear his spandex costume.
In an interview with Empire, the actor admits to being a little concerned about it.
“But I know that when I’m embarrassed, that usually means that I’m onto something funny, so I follow it fearlessly, with courage like a warrior. Like a tight-panted warrior,” he states.
Some critics concurred with Black’s view of his latest incarnation. The New York Times for instance, described it as “endearingly ridiculous”.
While the Los Angeles Times observed that “what’s rare to see, and what ultimately makes Nacho Libre so enjoyable, is the story of an underdog who’s allowed to remain a humble clown all the way to becoming a hero”.
But the majority were disappointed. The Chicago Sun-Times, for instance, concluded that “it takes some doing to make a Jack Black comedy that doesn’t work. But Nacho Libre does it”.
And Entertainment Weekly wrote: “It’s happened to all of us. You get revved to see a big Hollywood comedy, starring an actor so funny he could make you laugh in your sleep, and you’re disappointed. Majorly.”
The film opens in UK cinemas on August 11.