Santo in "The Mummy's Revenge"

Popular luchador Santo who wrestled in Mexico from the 1930's to the early 80's also had a prolific film career. For Halloween, I've decided to review 1970's The Mummy's Revenge.

We begin at a wrestling match. The match differed from many that I've seen because there were rounds. Each round was won by pinfall or submission, and it appeared that to win the match you had to score two out of three falls. I don't know if this is standard in Lucha Libre because I've not watched enough. Santo and his partner win, and this establishes that he is tough and that he is our hero. 

The basic plot of this film is that Santo is asked by professors to join an expedition to excavate Prince Nonoc's tomb. The team is supposed to bring back artifacts to put them in the museum to preserve them for posterity. We've heard this plot before. It's the basic plot of every horror movie that involves a mummy. 

The group hires an old man from a nearby village to guide them. This is where they learn the legend of the curse on Nonoc's tomb. The old man is reluctant to help them, however, he is persuaded when the group promises they will pay for his grandson's education after his death. He and his grandson join their expedition. Other characters include a beautiful female photographer, a secretary, a handsome intelligent professor, a crazy absent minded professor who has no clue where he is but who knows a lot about tombs and mummies, and a chef. 

My favorite part of their journey to the tomb was when they encountered a black panther in the jungle. One man pulls out his gun and aims at the beast. Santo decides to attempt to wrestle with the panther. This shows the audience how brave, strong, and heroic he is. 

When they begin searching the tomb, they come across a scroll that tells the story of Nonoc's death. He fell in love with a girl who was promised as a virginal sacrifice. He kidnapped her and they attempted to flee the area so they could be together. They were caught, she was killed, and he was buried alive.  His last words swore revenge on the descendants of the high priest who sentenced him. 

The old man is a direct descendant of the high priest. He warns the scientists not to disturb the tomb.When a scientist says they plan to put the items in the museum for all of civilization, the old man scoffs and says "You mean the white man's civilization." Not certain if that was just related to native mexican/spanish relations or if that was allusion to Mexico's relationship with the United States. 

The old man is the first person to die that night, as the mummy does attack. This part struck me because he is the only living relative of the little boy, Agapito. The boy runs and screams for help after witnessing his grandfather's neck broken by a mummy. Everyone is trying to figure out what happened, however, no one offers sympathy or condolence for the child. In a later scene, he and Santo are talking about it and Santo tells him he can cry now, but after this he must cry no more because to do so would not be manly. He then tells Agapito that he is not alone in the world, but that he will now take care of him.

Like all good movies with a hero, there is also a love interest. The love interest in the film is the photographer Susanna. There is no build up of a relationship over the course of the film, but one night after someone had been killed they are sitting outside at their camp, and Santo tells Susanna his feelings for her. She responds in the silliest way I've ever heard. She says "You are such a manly man that a girl would be honored even to receive just a little of your love." He's a masked man. You've never seen his face. Sure he's protecting you from a mummy and maybe you've seen a few of his wrestling matches. But this makes you wonder, does he wear the mask even during intimate relations. I speak of course of the character Santo, not the man behind the mask. At least this girl means it when she says she prefers someone's inner character to their looks.

The rest of the party is killed in various stages, except for Santo, Susanna, and Agapito. It's pretty predictable. At the end as they are fleeing the village, there is a final confrontation between Santo and the mummy. Santo makes quick work of the mummy and kills it. He unmasks it, and we find out there was no mummy at all. There was just a member of their party who wanted to kill everyone so he could have the treasure for himself.

We end at another wrestling match where we find out that Santo is still keeping his promises to both Susanna and Agapito.

Overall I enjoyed the film for its silliness. The two wrestling matches were the best part. I will likely watch more of his films just for fun. 

Wrestling fanfiction: harmless fantasy, violation of privacy, or something else?

I admit it. I read and write wrestling fanfiction. The things I write are tame compared to the things I've read. I write mostly sweet romances, very sappy with non-explicit sex. I've read things where Kevin Nash wants to "screw" the guy who played the fake Diesel into a mattress simply because he is narcissistic enough to wish he could do that to himself. There is every sort of story both sweet and sex driven that you can think of out there involving wrestlers. Fanfiction.net has around 40,000.

In discussions with my friends about this, I've said that I believe that the collective sexual fantasy of women between the ages of 12 and 60 could be found on Fanfiction.net. I don't know what percentage of wrestling fans fall into this demographic. A good portion of the women who write these stories write something called "the mary sue" which, for those unfamiliar with fanfiction, is an original character the author creates to represent herself. Her wonderful character falls in love with whatever wrestler the author is crushing on at the time, and they generally have a lovely relationship. Some of these involve abusive ex-boyfriends or the guy's ex-girlfriend trying to ruin their lives. But generally Mary Sue wins the day and the heart of her wrestling hero.

A lot of other women write "slash" fiction which links their two favorite male wrestlers together in a romantic relationship. I don't typically read this type of story, but they are very popular. The ones I really don't get are the ones that have real life brothers Matt and Jeff Hardy involved with each other. Undertaker and Kane I can accept a little more readily because they aren't actually related in real life. I do wonder what the men involved in these stories would think of what female fans want to do to them. I wonder if they'd be flattered or creeped out. My guess is that it depends on the individual story.

If I have any issue with the genre, it is that even though these men often wrestle under fake names, they are living people. They exist in the real world with lives we know nothing about. Do we have the right to speculate about their personal life? Do we have the right to try to insert ourselves into that? If our favorite wrestler is married, does that make writing fanfictions about him doubly wrong. Most fanfiction writers in the wrestling genre write somewhere in between Kayfabe and real life. They often use the wrestler's real name, and they talk about life on the road to some extent. If an author links Mark Callaway, The Undertaker, to her original character and she speculates on his real life, she might use details about his actual family that she's found on the internet. It's up to her I guess to decide if her character is going to help him cheat on his wife, or if she's going to conveniently write about Michelle and Undertaker getting divorced.

Or better yet, what if the object of your desire's personal life goes tragically horribly wrong? I'll use the example of Chris Benoit only because I fixated on him pretty badly in college. I had a large collage of pictures of him that I printed off the internet on my dorm room wall, and if I'd written fanfiction back it would have been about him. There is a good chance that if my fantasies had come true, I'd be dead right now. I wanted nothing more at that time to be his girlfriend/wife and to have the happy domestic life. We all know how that played out in real life for him. This is not a criticism of Benoit. It is a criticism of myself for romanticizing him and trying to make him into a character for my whimsical amusement.

I guess since I'm meeting more wrestlers through local promotions I'm starting to feel even weirder about speculating about the details of more famous wrestler's personal lives. I've met a lot of great people who are really passionate about the business. Most of them are happily married. Perhaps it is because I've met them in real life I don't feel the need to speculate about them. But I feel I should give more famous men and women the same courtesy. At the same time I'm not sure what to do with all the rampant thoughts about Daniel Bryan or Austin Aries that go through my head. Anyway as always thanks for reading. Post any feedback or opinions. 

OCT 20th PCW Porterdale Thoughts.

Saturday October 20th was the first PCW show where we thought the EMPIRE was a distant memory. Iboo and I decided since it was the show right before Halloween we would dress in costume. Ian went as "The Icon" Sting. I was "The Charasmatic Enigma" Jeff Hardy. A couple other fans showed up in face paint, but there appeared to be no other costumes in our audience. Oh well. We still had a good time.

The crowd for tonight's show was made up of what I call the hardcore regulars. We were small, but we were enthusiastic. The first match was a triple threat match between Morgan Davis III, Dynomite Soul, and Chip Day. I love Chip Day. He is both technically gifted and he knows how to play to the crowd. I've said in previous entries, I am not a play by play commentator. I spend as much of my time during the matches observing crowd reactions to the events in the ring as I do watching the ring itself. The crowd was really into the match as they also really love Chip.

There was a number one contender's match for the new unified title as well. It was Sylar Cross vs. PYB. PYB hesitated to start the match and showed what a coward he can be. Sylar Cross won, and the crowd went crazy.  Cross is another of our favorites.

Johnny Danger sat ringside tonight doing "color commentary". He explained to Quasi why he turned on the Males at Sacred Ground. He said he was trying to be his own man. He said that he'd not abandoned them. That, however, changed during Pandora's match with Nina Monet. As PYB beat up Pandora after the match, Danger came out with his signature chain. While it looked as if he was about to help them beatdown Pandora, he instead turned his attention to PYB cementing his exit from the Priority Males/Crown Jewel Records organization. The entire crowd chanted his name in support of his new found "goodness."

I remember very little about Yehi's match tonight. During his entrance he went to slap either my hand or my son's and knocked my soda to the floor. I spent the next few minutes trying to mop up. I was so busy cheering and singing along with his theme music I didn't notice him, so down went the soda. He was very apologetic after the show. It wasn't a big deal. It's a story to tell people.

The main event pitted our champion, The Demigod Mason against The fifth Column. The fifth column appeared to be twice as large as he was during the Platinum Royal at Sacred Ground. However it had to be him since he was wearing a freaky black faceless bodysuit. After Mason's amazing victory over Marx, it was weird to see him being dominated by this unknown force. The "Column" was victorious and our suspicions about his change in size and mannerisms were confirmed. It was none other than Shane Marx in the Column suit. What did he do with the real fifth column? Did he lock him in a closet? Will he come back for revenge? Was he or one of his minions the fifth column all along? Anyway you look at it, our new number one contender Sylar Cross had better watch his back.

Sacred Ground Chapter III part 2

This post has taken so long because I've been sick most of the week.

I admire PCW's commitment to good women's wrestling. I've lost all hope that WWE will revitalize their "Divas" division. Hearing that Sara del Rey was signed into a developmental deal did not make me think that she would save the divas division. It makes me think that the WWE will ruin her. All 4 women in the women's 4 way last woman standing match could snap kelly kelly in half. Aisha makes the best crazy face I've ever seen. Nina Monet has a great presence and plays her character well. I've not seen enough of Christi Whiplash to comment upon her, but she sells well. I heard a lot of good things about her from others, and I hope to see her in upcoming shows. PCW could use more female talent. I can't say enough good things about Pandora. She is charasmatic. She is a badass in every sense of the word. If Leatherface were chasing her and he dropped the chainsaw, she would pick it up and destroy him with it. She would not run away like Jessica Biel's character did in the remake film. Hell, she'd probably figure out how to get it away from him before he dropped it.

The casket match was very entertaining. Ian and I were kind of cheering for Devlin Valek. We like the hissing and the faces he makes. Vampires are one of my favorite supernatural creatures, and they have been since I was 5. Supernatural is always entertaining to watch. I'm not sure how I feel about the monster killer Asesino. We were in Avondale the night Marty Freeman dubbed that guy the "monster killer" and said they vowed to get rid of all the vampires, monsters and freaks in PCW. After that my rally cry became "Vampires not Empire" which was the slogan on my shirt that night. I like weird gimmicky characters like vampires and undead luchadors as much as I like pure wrestling. I think there is room for both in wrestling shows, and having both expands your audience because each appeals to a different part of your crowd.

I can't think of the right words to describe the main event. Cathartic comes to mind because at the end of the match when Mason won, I cried like one of those squealy girls at a concert when Justin Beiber sings their favorite love song. I know that sometimes "blood" is planned in matches, and that this wasn't one of those times. For a brief second during the match, I noticed a change in the expression of Miss Rachel. It went from her usual cocky sneer to a look of genuine concern for her co-worker. The match went on as if nothing had happened, and it was amazing watching Mason defy the odds to beat Shane Marx, unifying the belts, and winning back our show for the side of right, PCW. I saw the pictures posted the day after the match of the 17 stitches Mason received and the large knot on top of his head. I hope for his safe recovery and his swift return to the ring as our champion.

The entire event was a spectacle. I think there was a match and a character for every type of wrestling fan. I am really happy I was able to attend. I cannot wait for the October 20th show, and the beginning of a new chapter of PCW storylines. I cannot wait to see what happens to the splintered remnants of Empire now that they no longer control the company. I cannot wait to find out how this whole year of wrestling leads up to Sacred Ground 4.