since his breakthrough roles in “Amores Perros” and “Y tu mamá también” likely never foresaw him one day in the world of lucha libra wrestling.
But while almost anything with Bernal in it has been worth seeing, it’s been a little while — maybe his pair of movies with Pablo Larrain, 2012’s “No” and 2016’s “Neruda” — since Bernal had a sufficiently good part to, well, really go to the mat for.Roger Ross Williams’ based-on-a-true-story drama about the Mexican wrestler Saúl Armendáriz. He was an exótico in 1990s lucha libra wrestling who rose to become one of the sport’s most popular champions.
“Cassandro,” which opens in limited theaters Friday and debuts Sept. 22 on Amazon Prime Video, follows Armendáriz’ rise from scrawny outsider to center stage. The odds are always against him, but Bernal plays Armendáriz with an infectious innocence, even when he’s doing lines in the bathroom. Most of all, his transformation of the exótico into something more than is prescribed by luchador tradition makes for a stirring metaphor of gay empowerment.
They were also masked, but Armendáriz chooses to go without — an especially bold move considering the withering waves of homophobia directed at him by many in the crowd. But Armendáriz wins them over, and in doing so, achieves something spectacular, turning a gay stereotype into a hero. “I felt like Wonder Woman,” the real Armendáriz once said.
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