Professor Popinjay's Compendium of Perspicacity

A Non-review by Professor Popinjay

This movie was so weird. It wasn’t Eraserhead weird, thankfully. Or The Forbidden Zone weird. Nacho Libre was Napoleon Dynamite weird. I suppose there’s good reason for that.

It had a plot. The plot made sense for the most part. It had a “feel good” moment at the end. But the bulk was just bizarre and I loved it.

This very much came as a big-budget answer to Napoleon Dynamite. Napoleon taught them they (gnomes) don’t have to have a huge budget, big name actors, amazing effects, or a full orchestra soundtrack to make a great movie. But for good measure they threw in Jack Black acting in Mexico-face and hired Danny Elfman to do the music, just in case. To direct, they would turn to Napoleon Dynamite director himself, Mr. Jared Hess.

Can you think of any other films in this strange vein? If you said Gentlemen Broncos you are correct. It was also directed by Jared Hess and I fully recommend it if you liked Nacho and Napoleon. Hess seems to have this style, some compare it to Wes Anderson but I would not. I usually can’t stand Wes Anderson stuff but I love Jared Hess’ work. Maybe it’s the random occurrences and quirky characters that reminds people of Anderson but in my opinion Hess’ work is funny and Anderson’s….ain’t.

The “I hate orphans” scene and the “secret tunnels” scene make this movie worth the watch but the whole thing is great. I’m really trying hard not to spoil it but I want to talk here about the funny so badly.

When you are a man, sometimes you wear stretchy pants in your room. It’s for fun.

I made some short promos for a church I was part of back in the day. They can be seen on YouTube. They were made to promote the church and extend the invitation to literally anyone and everyone, no matter what. We called them the “Who’s Welcome” videos. I will post a link. In one promo we establish the character of the Professional Tambourine Lady. In another we establish a character who eats musical instruments. (I may have had a little green Tambourine myself that day.) We also did one for Cardboard Man (a parody of iron man) and Darth Vader.

Finally we made a film about the church accidently challenging a luchador. El Chango Rabia (which was his real life gamer tag and none of us for a moment considered possible problematic racial implications when making this) was played by my dear friend José Luis Quintero. He was not the greatest actor. I say that lovingly because that’s why he was so perfect. We added a little Napoleon Dynamite score over it and just worked.

In the short film, to humor the Luchador, the pastor attempts to give him the greatest fight of his life which made the Luchador very happy. Unfortunately, their roughhousing inadvertently ends up destroying Tambourine Lady’s tambourine thus unleashing her fury. Unexpectedly and with inexplicable melee combat prowess the Tambourine Lady proceeds to mop the floor with the Luchador, figuratively speaking. It’s followed by a bizarre cameo of Darth Vader and Cardboard Man.

All of this was inspired by Nacho Libre. For that I am indebted to Jared Hess and his unique directing style. Please enjoy: Genesis Church’s Who’s Welcome promotional video: The Luchador.