Every Once Upon A Time Movie Ranked Worst To Best

Tarantino's frequent collaborator Robert Rodriguez got to the Leone pastiching Once Upon A title almost two decades before his Grindhouse cohort.

2003's Once Upon A Time In Mexico was the climactic episode in the trilogy of "Mexploitation" films written, directed, edited, shot and scored by the hyperactive multi-hyphenate Rodriguez.

While Rodriguez's first Mariachi film had been an ultra-low budget tightly-focused story of a guitarist and a bunch of hitmen, here both the lead character and the world of the film have become something far more heightened and grandiose.

Rodriguez throws everything including flamethrower guitar cases at a convoluted narrative of twists and double crosses including CIA plots, drug lords, and revenge. Not all of it sticks, but it is all done with swaggering chutzpah and, in an usual step for a Once Upon A Time title, a breakneck pace.

Johnny Depp may have become something of a self-parody in his increasingly detached performances of recent years, but Once Upon A Time In Mexico found him on the cusp of Pirates-based A-list blockbuster stardom and still revelling in playing supporting weirdos.

Whether shooting the chef because of his superb rice and pork dish or gunning down the bad guys even after his eyes have been drilled out of his head, Depp's untrustworthy CIA agent utterly steals the show in a memorably madcap movie.