El Topo (1970)
★½ — El Topo (1970)
Alejandro Jodorowsky wrote, directed, starred in, and composed the score for El Topo, a film that arrived out of Mexico in 1970 on a modest budget of around $400,000 and became one of the founding texts of the midnight movie circuit. Jodorowsky, a Chilean-born polymath who had worked in theatre, mime, and avant-garde performance before turning to film (his debut feature Fando y Lis had already caused a riot at a Mexican film festival in 1968), cast his own six-year-old son Brontis in the opening scenes. The film found its audience largely through John Lennon and Yoko Ono, whose enthusiasm persuaded Beatles manager Allen Klein to acquire the distribution rights, leading to late-night screenings at the Elgin Theatre in New York that ran for months and cemented its cult reputation.
A-Z World Movie Tour Mexico What the actual fuck was this? I thought I was getting something like Shogun Assassin at the beginning. A lone warrior, a child, some mythic badassery. Instead, I got an incoherent, self-important, grotesque mess masquerading as art. Apparently David Lynch and Nicholas Winding Refn are fans and I can see how. I really can't stand movies that gratuitously show rape and sexual violence and all this whacky random scenes, characters and plots. It's not "good" cinema. It's just an unenjoyable mess. Never once has the phrase "oh mate I've got a great film we can watch together" been uttered before this movie begins. This movie is full of nonsense. Religious symbolism with no payoff, endless scenes of amputees, dwarves, monks doing... something, and so much rape and violence it starts to feel like a fever dream from a guy who just threw a bunch of bad ideas at a wall to see what stuck. It's troublesome in every way. It's pretentious, exploitative, and utterly exhausting. I heard he's been trying to get funding for a sequel for 55 years. The only thing that didn’t make me want to claw my eyes out was the soundtrack. That’s it. One star for the music, half a star for the sheer audacity.
Rating: ★½ | Year: 1970 | Watched: 2025-07-18
Where to watch (UK)
Stream: Arrow Video Amazon Channel
Rent: Apple TV Store · Amazon Video · Google Play Movies · YouTube
Buy: Apple TV Store · Amazon Video · Google Play Movies · YouTube
Physical: Amazon UK
Affiliate disclosure: Movies With Macca may earn a small commission on purchases or subscriptions started via these links. It costs you nothing extra.
Related on Movies With Macca
More from Mexico: Nightmare City (1980) · Violet Perfume: Nobody Hears You (2001) · Simon of the Desert (1965) · Babel (2006)
More from the 1970s: Fantastic Planet (1973) · Here and Elsewhere (1976) · Italianamerican (1974) · Punishment Park (1971)
More adventure: Alice in Wonderland (1951) · The Eagle (1925) · Louisiana Story (1948) · The General (1926)
More drama: Viy (1967) · Wonder (2017) · A Better Tomorrow (1986) · Beautiful Boy (2018)
