Nacho Libre

Nacho Libre failed to meet box-office expectations. Who determines those expectations, I don’t know. But they do suggest that the film was mismarketed.

I found myself thinking of Tim Burton as I watched Nacho Libre. In Edward Scissorhands, the original Batman, Nightmare Before Christmas, and Big Fish, Burton creates fully realized worlds parallel to but separate from our real one. I was also reminded of Napoleon Dynamite, where the alternative world rests more in the bizarre and nerdy array of characters than in physical setting. Not surprisingly, Nacho Libre was co-written by Jerusha and Jared Hess, co-screenwriters for Napoleon Dynamite. Jared Hess directed.

Nacho Libre takes the concept of a Mexican priest who wants to be a professional wrestler and fully and imaginatively develops it. The result is an extremely detailed, nuanced comic film. The comedy derives from setting, characters, plot. A rich array of characters populate the foreground and background of the story. Many of the wrestlers who Jack Black’s character Nacho faces are authentic Mexican wrestlers.

The basic plot follows Nacho’s life as an orphan in a Mexican monastery. When he reaches adulthood, he becomes a friar whose main job is to cook and serve food to the orphans, priests, and nuns. Around the same time he decides to try to become a wrestler, he falls in love with a beautiful nun, Sister Encarnacion. His quest to wrestle is tied to his desire to impress her and to escape his demeaning work in the monastery. Yet even as he wrestles, he remains a faithful friar, frequently showing concern for the spiritual welfare of his sidekick Esqueleto, a street person he has recruited as his partner from a nearby town.

The setting of this film contributes significantly to the overall fantasy. The Mexican countryside is depicted with soft pastel colors, and the overall effect is both exotic and beautiful.

Most of the actors are Mexican or Hispanic. The film is full of the usual stereotypes, though each character is an individual, and there is no real effort to create humor or satire by making fun of or ridiculing these characters. Instead the film treats them with affection, humor, and respect. And it portrays in simple and straightforward terms professional wrestling in Mexico.

Nacho Libre brims with whimsy and fantasy. To an extent these elements are of a piece with the subject of wrestling in Mexico, which is different from but parallel to the largely fake and staged industry of professional wrestling in the United States.

Jack Black fully inhabits Nacho. He creates a character who is part comic book figure and part human. As in The School of Rock he creates a character who is warm, believable, and fully human—not a caricature. Nacho Libre gives Black full opportunity to exercise his considerable skills as a slapstick comic actor, though slapstick is not a major element in the film. He succeeds in his role because he is, within bounds, a talented actor.

Part of the film’s whimsy is reflected in the fact that a priest and a nun are not supposed to fall in love with each other. But the film is full of such whimsical discrepancies. This small but excellent comic film was a pleasure to watch.