I saw this movie on the day it opened and then went away on vacation. My initial review got lost somewhere in cyberspace, so here is my second attempt.

Have you seen “Napoleon Dynamite?” Remember how it seemed lame while you were watching it, but afterwards you found that you really enjoyed it? As you remembered all the weird parts of the movie you found yourself laughing and wanting to watch those scenes again? “Nacho Libre,” is directed by the guy who directed “Napoleon Dynamite” and he and his wife wrote the screenplay with Mike White, (“School of Rock”).
“Nacho Libre” is no “Napoleon Dynamite.”

Jack Black plays Ignacio, a man who was raised in an orphanage in Oaxaca. He is now the cook and because the orphanage/monastery is poor, he has little to feed the children. Always a fan of wrestling, he stumbles upon a sign advertising an open tag-team wrestling tournament. Ignacio teams up with a skinny wretch, Esqueleto, and they proceed to lose time after time, while still making money. When the people at the monastery find out he is wrestling, something they consider an abomination, he leaves but is determined to wrestle once more and earn enough money for the orphanage.

The movie is moderately amusing. Black’s monk with dreams of pro wrestling is a fun character with an interesting accent and the wrestling sequences involve moments of slapstick hilarity, but the movie doesn’t stick with you. Unlike some of the great comedies of the past few years, “Nacho Libre” offers up nothing that would it include it in the pantheon of recent comedy classics (“School of Rock,” “Anchorman,” Zoolander,”).

The deadpan dialogue that was hilarious in “Napoleon Dynamite,” falls flat here and Black, typically a whirling dervish of energy in his films, is restrained way too much in this film. The slow pace and mode of speech that made “Napoleon Dynamite” seem so unique, now makes me wonder whether that is the only joke in Hess’ book. Although there were inspired moments in “Nacho Libre,” particularly the “Satan’s Cavemen” match and a scene of Black crashing a party with a mariachi band, it appeared that the audience was expected to laugh a lot at a fat guy and a skinny guy wrestling better wrestlers and losing. No thanks.

“Nacho Libre” should have been a sure-fire hit and because it misses the mark it seems worse than it really is.

**

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