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 enlarge | Directors: Espen Sandberg, Joachim Roenning
Actors: Penelope Cruz, Salma Hayek, Steve Zahn, Dwight Yoakam, Denis Arndt
Studio: 20th Century Fox
Category: DVD
List Price: $14.98
Buy Used: $1.32
You Save: $13.66 (91%)
New (47) Used (59) Collectible (1) from $1.32
Rating:  46 reviews
Sales Rank: 14402
Format: Ac-3, Color, Dolby, Dubbed, Dvd-video, Full Screen, Subtitled, Widescreen, Ntsc
Languages: English (Original Language), Spanish (Original Language), English (Subtitled), Spanish (Subtitled), English (Dubbed), Spanish (Dubbed)
Rating: PG-13 (Parental Guidance Suggested)
Region: 1
Aspect Ratio: 1.33:1
Number Of Discs: 1
Running Time: 92 Minutes
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.2
Dimensions (in): 7.1 x 5.4 x 0.6
MPN: FOXD2240318D
UPC: 024543403111
EAN: 0024543403111
ASIN: B000K7VHNW
Theatrical Release Date: 2006
Release Date: January 9, 2007
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
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| Customer Reviews:
 Comic Western Starring Salma Hayek and Penelope Cruz May 5, 2008
Tsuyoshi
Salma Hayek and Penelope Cruz are in one movie and they fight bad guys in turn-of-the-century Mexico with a gun and a knife. There is one cat fight scene by the two ladies and one comic relief provided by ever-reliable Steve Zahn. You can say "Bandidas" is conventional and predictable and the film knows it. Still you just can't hate this film especially when two leading ladies are clearly having fun. So why shouldn't we? br / br /"Bandida" are about two Mexican women with opposite personalities Maria (Penelope Cruz) and Sara (Salma Hayek). When one of their father is killed, and the other heavily injured, by villainous Jackson (Dwight Yoakam) hired by a New York bank, the two women join hands to form a bank-robbing team for revenge. But of course, their first rule is, "Don't kill anybody." br / br /Co-produced (and co-written) by Luc Besson, "Bandidas" is an old-school fun movie which doesn't take itself seriously. With the beautiful cinematography by Thierry Arbogast and the music by Eric Serra, both Besson's regular duo, the film is fun to watch though it could have been wackier or more action-paced than it is. Like many other films written by Besson ("TAXI" series, for instance), the plot is very thin, allowing for the comical interplay between two main characters Penelope Cruz and Salma Hayek, always sexy and delightful. br / br /"Bandidas" is a light-hearted action/comedy. It is nothing groundbreaking, but still fun.
Surprisingly good April 24, 2008
DaveP (USA)
A surprisingly funny and action-packed western that throws together two of the hottest exotic actresses out there as they join to avenge the attacks on their families and Mexican town from greedy American banks looking to take their land for a railroad. Cruz and Hayek play off each other very well as the fledgling bandidas from opposite sides of the tracks, Dwight Yoakam is effectively sleazy as the bank enforcer and Steve Zahn lends some additional comic relief as the Old West's version of a CSI agent. Bank robberies, gunfights,spurs, campfires, bountiful cleavage and corsets abound as in your standard westerns. Don't go in expecting The Good The Bad and The Ugly and and you'll have a good time.
 Bandidas "Entertaining" April 15, 2008
D. Jeter (South Bend, Indiana United States)
BandidasThis to me was a fun western. There are so many good westerns around but how often do you see the two top latin female actresses in the same movie. I thought it was refreshing although the outlaw theme is not new but the story that never gets old is the lust for more money and power played by the "banks" and it's agents verses the common folks. This is not a John Wayne western with plenty of grit but it is interesting. The opening scene is my favorite part where the horse beats Ms Cruz in a game of tick-tack-toe by cheating. Aside from that the bad guy was one you love to hate, the women are amazing, obviously and the chemistry between the two actresses was very good. I laughed and enjoyed this one and it's good to watch a movie where the women are not getting undressed every 5 minutes.
Enjoyable, forgettable fluff March 24, 2008
Genevieve Hayes (Australia)
It's a typical Western scenario: the rich gringo bankers are trying to cheat the poor honest Mexicans out of their land in order to sell it to the railroads at a huge profit. Don't those gringos ever learn? Of course, there is a pair of brave Mexicans who stand up and fight against the gringos and ultimately become heroes of the people. The "twist" in this film is that our protagonists are two beautiful women (Salma Hayek and Penelope Cruz - Cruz is actually Spanish, but hey, Spaniard, Mexicans, same thing), an educated lady and an unsophisticated farmer's daughter, who turn to robbing banks after Hayek's father is murdered and Cruz's father turned away from his land. br / br /"Bandidas" is co-written and co-produced by Luc Besson and this is, most certainly, not Besson's best film (pick just about any film that he has written that stars Jean Reno and you will find a better film). However, that didn't really bother me. Considering the fact that this movie went straight to DVD, I didn't expect very much of it. What this film is is entertaining fluff. This is not a life changing film; I will probably have forgotten everything about it by the end of the week; but for the 90 minutes that I spent watching it, I had a good time. br / br /All of the actors in it are solid, A-list (or, at least, upper B-list) actors, who do good jobs in their respective roles (as well as Cruz and Hayek, the film also stars Steve Zahn, as a Sherlock Holmes-esque detective sent to catch the "bandidas", and Dwight Yokham as the head gringo villain). The plot is about as stupid and predictable as your average Western plot, and to make matters worse, we are expected to believe that both Cruz's and Hayek's characters are attracted to Zahn (yeah right). Nevertheless, if you wanted to see something with a realistic storyline, you probably wouldn't be considering watching this film in the first place. br /
Butch and Sundance Redux as Lovely, Loyal Latinas in Lightweight Escapist Fare March 12, 2008
Ed Uyeshima (San Francisco, CA USA)
2 out of 2 found this review helpful
Pairing Salma Hayek and Penelope Cruz in a campy, comic buddy western turns out to be a mildly amusing ploy, but I just wish this 2006 film had more true grit and a sharper sense of the characters than the screenplay by Luc Besson and Robert Mark Kamen exhibits. As vividly beautiful as the two actresses are, together they are physically and temperamentally too similar to be credible opposites. They are both compelling enough presences onscreen, especially playing such self-sufficient women, but the lack of contrast makes it hard to think they are little more than two halves of the same character. They are guided by first-time filmmakers Joachim Roenning and Espen Sandberg, which may account for the lack of visual flair that Robert Rodriguez or Quentin Tarantino could have brought to the story. Regardless, the pacing is lightning-quick, and the cartoonish touches provide the requisite popcorn entertainment. br / br /Set in turn-of-the-last-century Mexico, two women are leading separate lives - Sara Sandoval is the pampered, worldly daughter of a wealthy landowner, and Maria Alvarez is the dirt-poor farm girl who has relied on her horse sense and keen marksmanship. Their paths cross when seedy, bloodthirsty robber baron Tyler Jackson steals from their respective fathers and kills them both. Naturally, Sara and Maria seek revenge but must settle their own class-conflict squabbling first (via the inevitable cat-fighting scene). With the help of grizzled former bank robber Bill Buck, Sara and Maria become "Las Bandidas", Mexico's version of Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid. Things get complicated when Jackson hires New York criminologist Quentin Cooke to track down the women, but you can probably guess that Quentin succumbs to their ample charms. The script throws in some interesting economic theory discussions, but mostly flimsy excuses are made to insert some silly scenes like having the women dress as saloon prostitutes out of the Moulin Rouge to seduce Quentin. br / br /Other than the mandatory gunplay, the elaborate stunts include a Tarzan-like use of a swinging chain, the creative use of ice skates during a heist, a slo-mo action scene that feels stolen from The Matrix, and a paean to the famous river-jumping scene in Butch Cassidy. There is no doubt that Cruz and Hayek are having a good time, though they are hardly stretched here. Even though they bond in a predicable way, it would have been more interesting to insert some ambiguity along the lines of Thelma Louise. With his bedraggled Marilyn Manson-like hair bested only by Javier Bardem's pageboy in No Country for Old Men, Dwight Yoakam is not quite as menacing a presence as Walker. Steve Zahn also seems comparatively passive as Quentin, even though he looks appropriately dazed in the seduction scene. Sam Shepard is barely in the film as Buck, but he makes his brief sequence count with reliable authority. The extras on the 2007 DVD are sparse - a superficial four-minute making-of featurette, the original theatrical trailer, and a commentary track by Hayek and Cruz, has entertainment value but not too much insight into the production itself.
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