Adventures of El Frenetico and Go-Girl
By John Oak Dalton • Jan 23rd, 2003 • Category: Comedy, ReviewsEl Frenetico is a boozing superhero/Mexican wrestler at the twilight of his career. Go-Girl is a perky, upbeat kung-fu butt-kicker with an ill-conceived devotion to her mentor, El Frenetico. Together the oddly-matched duo take on a bevy of offbeat foes with modest plans for world domination. The Adventures of El Frenetico and Go-Girl is a curious microcinema endeavor; a series of superhero adventures that look like they could have traveled on some shag-carpeted time machine from the kitchy-mod 60s to today.
Someone who thinks the 60s Batman television show is the height of Shakespearean drama and the pinnace of the thespian arts will find these three tales to be a veritable Aeschylus’ Oresteia as well.
Like El Frenetico fought his inner demons, I too struggled with my feelings about the feature. Some things are great; the surprising martial arts adeptness of Go-Girl Frances Lee, and the equally surprisingly adept acting talents of Louise Millman, who plays a unique variety of roles in every episode. Some things are terrible; bouts of wincing-bad acting, and the kind of production value you might catch in the average high school AV project.
But this is definitely a case where a viewer’s mileage may vary; though certainly director Pat Bishow scores points for trying to push the envelope with his meager resources, providing a lot of entertainment bang for the buck, and putting a lot of creative energy on display.
Running Time: 90 min.
Director: Pat Bishow
Writer: Pat Bishow
Cast: Charlie Pellegrino, Frances Lee, Louise Millman
Score: ** 1/2
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John Oak Dalton is a Community Television Station Manager by day, and a DIY acolyte by night. In the 80s he made Super-8 movies and his own basement mix tapes. In the 90s he hosted a cable-access show and made his own zines and minicomics. In the 21st Century he began working with grassroots video and microcinema and writing b-movies, and has more than a dozen projects on the shelf, on screen, in development, or in production.
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