ĭuring the filming of the sex scene, Salma Hayek became very uncomfortable and started uncontrollably crying. Principal photography took place entirely in Ciudad Acuña, Mexico, across from Del Rio, Texas. Raúl Juliá was originally cast as Bucho but died before production began on October 24, 1994. Since Banderas replaced Gallardo as the actor for the main character, the filmmakers re-shot the final showdown from El Mariachi as a flashback sequence for Banderas' character in Desperado. Carlos Gallardo, who played the title role of El Mariachi, appears in Desperado as Campa, a friend of Banderas' Mariachi. Rodriguez's friend Quentin Tarantino has a cameo as "Pick-up Guy".
The two drive away together, but shortly return and pick up the guitar case full of guns just in case. Carolina catches up to him on the road and picks him up, with El Mariachi initially leaving his weapons on the side of the road. The two visit the boy in the hospital, and El Mariachi leaves on his own. El Mariachi kills his brother, then shoots his remaining henchmen. Bucho offers to release El Mariachi if he lets him kill Carolina. It is then revealed that Bucho is El Mariachi's older brother Cesar, to which El Mariachi had been unaware before seeing him from the rooftop. El Mariachi sees the kid wounded in the crossfire and rushes him to a hospital.Įl Mariachi and Carolina head over to Bucho's compound to confront him directly.
A massive gun battle ensues, and most of Bucho's goons along with Campa and Quino are killed. The trio meet up on the edge of town and encounter Bucho's goons. Realizing that Bucho will never stop hunting them, El Mariachi calls his friends Campa and Quino in to help. The two hide in a hotel room.īucho gathers his men and tells them to kill anyone they see in town that they don't know. The two fight their way out of the burning building and onto a local rooftop, where El Mariachi gets a clear shot at Bucho but inexplicably chooses not to attempt to kill him. In the morning, Bucho's men arrive and attack them while setting the bookstore ablaze. Meanwhile, Bucho realizes that Carolina lied to him. Carolina finishes stitching up El Mariachi's wounds, and that evening, she gives El Mariachi a new guitar, which he plays for her before they make passionate love. She feigns ignorance of the commotion in town, and Bucho leaves. Unexpectedly, Bucho visits her, and she hastily hides El Mariachi. El Mariachi returns to Carolina and learns that Bucho paid to build her bookstore as another front for his drug-dealing. He angrily confronts the boy, who tells him most people in the town work for Bucho. He learns that the kid is being used by his father to mule drugs hidden in his guitar. They take the body back to Bucho, who realizes they have killed the wrong person, a hit-man named Navajas sent by the Colombians to kill El Mariachi.Īs El Mariachi wanders through the streets, he meets the kid with the guitar. Bucho's men arrive at the scene, mistake the man (who dresses in black) for El Mariachi and kill him. Outside the church, a man armed with throwing knives ambushes them, kills Buscemi and severely wounds El Mariachi. Upset by the massacre at the bar, Buscemi convinces El Mariachi to give up his quest for blood. He goes to the town church and talks to Buscemi. El Mariachi asks her to help him find Bucho.
While he rests, she discovers the guns in his guitar case and realizes who he is. In the bookstore, Carolina tends to El Mariachi's wounds. Paranoid, Bucho orders his men to hunt down the man "dressed in black". Bucho arrives at the bar to survey the carnage. Carolina, the woman whom El Mariachi shields from Tavo's bullets, takes him to her bookstore. On the street, Tavo wounds El Mariachi before being killed himself. He kills everyone in the bar, but Tavo, who was in a back room conducting illegal business, survives and follows him outside. At the Tarasco bar, El Mariachi engages in a tense standoff with Bucho's goons before a massive gunfight erupts. Having been a guitarist himself, he gives the boy some pointers. Meanwhile, El Mariachi has a dream of his encounter with Moco, Bucho's underling, who killed his lover and shot his left hand, but Buscemi awakens him and tells him to continue searching for Bucho at the bar.Įl Mariachi meets a child, whose father allegedly plays guitar for a living.
The bar's patrons are uninterested until Buscemi mentions the name "Bucho". In August 1994 at the Tarasco bar in Mexico, an American man named Buscemi tells the story of how he witnessed a massacre in another bar committed by a Mexican with a guitar case full of guns.