Mildly entertaining and distracting but not that strong, quirky or funny

Rating: Null/10 (12 May 2007)

In a Mexican orphanage run by priests and nuns, one priest is continually berated by his peers and left to do simple domestic chores such as cooking. In his heart though, are dreams of more and these dreams are realised when he discovers the world of wrestling. Donning a mask and teaming up with homeless Esqueleto, they learn that they get paid even for losing their matches and soon set out to improve the lives of the orphans and themselves.
Aiming very much for the weirdly comic approach that Napoleon Dynamite had, Nacho Libre takes a comedy sketch and tries to make a film out of it  and the strain is obvious. The plot isn't really strong enough to hold everything up but this shouldn't really matter as the laughs should be the thing that holds the interest. Sadly in this regard the film is not really that funny. It is amusing of course because it has an edge of imaginative and silliness that works well but it simply doesn't have the depth to fill out even 90 minutes. The character produces a couple of jokes and these are repeated once the material runs dry. I suppose if you can get into the silliness then it will make you laugh but for me it just seemed too basic to really be worth repeat viewing.
Black is a big plus in this regard because he really gets into the character and does all he can with the simple script. Likewise Jimenez is amusing and works well with Black. De la Reguera is perhaps a bit weak but she is key in providing a bit of a foundation for the story. Hess directs with a good feel for the tone of the material and it works, if only his script had been stronger to have matched it.
A solid follow up to Napoleon Dynamite then but not actually that strong or funny and understandably it struggled to find its audience. Those looking for quirky will have been satisfied to some degree but this is not a "Jack Black" comedy as it was billed as the laughs are too infrequent but likewise the material is not strong enough to get by without constant audience laughter. Distracting but nothing more than that.