CASSANDRO - Mark Reviews Movies

Cassandro, Amazon Studios

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Review by Mark Dujsik | September 14, 2023

Based on a true story but refreshingly not making a big deal of the fact, Cassandro dramatizes the early career of professional wrestler Saúl Armendáriz, an American man of Mexican heritage who became somewhat famous and significant in the lucha libre circuit during the late 1980s and through half of the '90s. Co-writer/director Roger Ross Williams only cares about the sport, though, as a way to communicate the internal conflict and turmoil of his main character.

Saúl (Gael García Bernal), an openly gay man in a sport that prides itself on traditional notions of masculinity, has trouble being himself, except when he's in the ring as exótico wrestler Cassandro. For those who don't know about the specifics of a luchador show/fight, the movie explains the archetypical characters pretty succinctly. There are heroes and villains, both of whom usually wear masks and are easy enough to root for or against, but exóticos are in a different category.

At the time of this story, they were presented literally as "others"—men displaying flamboyant behavior, often wearing more feminine clothing, and guaranteed to lose any match in which they participate. The exóticos existed to be defeated, mocked, jeered, and often the target of homophobic slurs from the crowd. As Cassandro, Saúl is on the receiving end of all of that, until the power and charisma of this persona, as well as the determination of the luchador behind it, transformed him into a figure that the audience could laugh with, accept, and, because of the hard work and skill the wrestler displayed, admire.

Whether or not the real Cassandro had as much of an impact as the movie suggests here is irrelevant. The big question is whether or not the screenplay by Williams and David Teague convinces us that Saúl/Cassandro's story feels consequential enough on some level to make the suggestion in the first place.

Outside the ring and thanks to García Bernal's internalized performance, the story is an intimate one. It focuses on Saúl struggling in his career, finding comfort in his supportive mother Yocasta (Perla De La Rosa), dealing with a secret affair, and learning to accept himself in the face of a society, a wresting culture, and some personal relationships that have wrongly taught him that he shouldn't.

There's a decided disconnect between these private scenes and those public ones, as Saúl takes on the Cassandro persona, an unapologetic version of himself whom he wants to be in some ways. That's part of the point of the movie, of course, since it's about a man searching for who exactly he is and could be, but it's also a reason that Saúl/Cassandro's professional accomplishments, as well as what he comes to represent to others, feel like a bit of an afterthought here.

Those scenes beyond the ring, though, are fairly strong. When Saúl's career hits something of an impasse in terms of his skills and popularity in matches across the border in Juárez, he takes a promoter's advice to drop the mask and adopt an exótico character. He has one stipulation, though: His character has to win. At a time when a wrestling audience can barely see an exótico without hurling epitaphs, that's basically an impossibility.

With the help of woman wrestler and trainer Sabrina (Roberta Colindrez), Saúl improves, and as Cassandro, he starts to win over a sizeable percentage of the crowd. Meanwhile, his rising fame helps things at home, where he lives with his mother in a close and almost co-dependent kind of relationship, because Saúl can start looking at a dream house as something that's only a few well-paid gigs away from becoming a reality. It doesn't change, though, that Saúl's mother still pines for his father, a married man who made time for Yocasta and their son—until Saúl came out as a teenager. His mother accepts him and hopes he'll meet a man who'll make him happy one day, but quietly, she blames Saúl for the loss of the man she still loves.

It's a complicated bond, given a decent amount of attention and a sensitive portrayal by the two actors. Saúl's personal life is even more complex considering his affair with fellow luchador Gerardo (Raúl Castillo), a man who, not unlike his father, is living a double life. Married to a woman and with two kids, Saúl's lover forces the couple into a life of secrecy, not only because it could ruin his marriage, but also out of fear of what it could mean to his career and his reputation among his fellow wrestlers. After all, Gerardo sees how people respond to Saúl publicly and hears what other luchadors say about him behind his back.

Is it any wonder, then, that Cassandro makes no excuses for his identity and that Saúl insists his persona must win? The wrestling scenes give a sense of the freedom and fun of the character, with García Bernal's performance almost becoming a dual one for as different as the man and the luchador he's portraying are. If the private scenes of Cassandro feel lived-in and detailed and psychologically complex, the professional side of this story ends up feeling routine by comparison and in practice. That might have worked, except the movie ultimately finds its meaning more in the impact of Saúl's career and less in his personal struggles. The latter feel far more consequential, though.

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