Welcome to Acapulco (Movie Review)
Video game designer Matt Booth has one shot to save his career by unveiling his biggest project yet at the Video Game Awards in New Mexico. But after running into a friend at the airport and having a little too much to drink before his flight, he ends up in ACTUAL Mexico – specifically, Acapulco. As soon as he lands, he finds himself on the run from high-powered criminals, deadly hitmen and the Feds, all looking for a mysterious package that he has allegedly smuggled through customs yet knows nothing about. Partnering with a badass, beautiful femme-fatale and channeling his inner video game action hero, the pair unravels a conspiracy that could shake the foundation of the United States, maybe even the world.
It’s finally spring in Los Angeles, so now that the cold has gone away and warmed up a bit, what a way to settle into the evening that with the new film” Welcome to Acapulco. The film stars Michael Madsen, William Baldwin, and Paul Sorvino. With that being said, the way the film is being marketed on the marquee sort of betrays the overall picture. The aforementioned stars are only in it for a few minutes each and the film isn’t even an hour and a half.
Matt Todd (Michael Kingsbaker) is a hot shot video game designer, who after a mix-up is transported to beautiful Acapulco, Mexico. He’s got the CIA, FBI, and every other agency with an acronym hot on his tail for a package he is supposedly carrying. Fortunately for him, and us, he is rescued by the lovely and talented Adriana Vasquez (Ana Serradilla). She’s equipped with a lethal set of skills and will try to do everything she can from letting Todd get killed.
That’s the cusp of this tale, which is formulaic at its core, but on a technical level – the film actually rocks. They actually filmed it in Acapulco and some of the scenery and cinematography is epic in scope. The cast look like they had a blast filming it and it shows. That’s the good news. The bad news is that our protagonist nearly sinks the film with his ineptness. I can’t tell whether Kingsbaker is just a bad actor or whatnot, but the constant whiny narration, his lame jokes, etc., it falls flat 90% of the time. In fact, one of my favorite scenes in the film is of him waking up on the airplane to Acapulco and the old lady next to him calls him “feo,” “cochino,” and “borracho.” Since I speak Spanish, I had a laugh with that one. She basically called him ugly, dirty, and a drunk. Her line delivery killed it.
Outside of Todd’s character, the action is great and so are the production values. Adriana kicks major ass. Madsen, Sorvino, and Baldwin also chew up the scenery quite nicely. Welcome to Acapulco runs a brisk 85 minutes without credits, so it’s an easy film to get through. Is it a great film and something worthy to go out of your way for? No. Is it decent enough for a warm spring day? Sure.
Welcome to Acapulco is available
to rent or buy in HD on Amazon!
