It certainly looks as though he'd like to be. The Chilean-born, Denmark-raised director has turned in his latest feature as both writer and director, an action comedy titled Pistoleros. This sort of project is rare in the extreme in Denmark - Lasse Spang Olsen is the only other director that really dips his toe in this particular pool there - but it looks like he's pulled off a good one. The cast is stellar, featuring a run down Zlatko Buric (famous in these parts from the Pusher films), Thomas Bo Larsen and Kim Bodnia in a small role, and the trailer just oozes style.
All goes terribly wrong when Frank Lowies, an infamous criminal and his petty gang of thieves, commit their biggest and final heist. Frank and his partners in crime all end up in jail, and an urban legend is created; the police never found all the stolen money. Through the years the urban legend grows bigger, and the amount of money hidden increases everyday. Is it 1, 5 or even 10 million? Now all crooks, thieves and small time hustlers are looking for the lost millions. Is it true or is it just an urban legend?
I think Shaky Gonzalez debut feature as both writer and director was "Angel of The Night" back in 1999, a stylish vampire film similar to "From Duk Till Dawn".
I'd thought that was a short for some reason. Fixed it.
Naw it's a feature. Picked up the DVD last time I was in Denmark. Back then the cast was pretty much fresh faced unknowns but now it feature superstar Mads Mikelsen.
Actually "Angel of the Night" begun life as two separate films that ran like 40 minutes each. When the powers that be saw them they commissioned Shaky to shoot a wraparound story so the whole thing could be turned into a feature film. They had to cut out a LOT of material from the original films, so they don't make a whole lot of sense anymore, but you can still watch them and appreciate Shaky incredible visual talent.
I really don't understand why this guy hasn't been snatched up by some big American producer years ago. He's been making these small, incredible action shorts since he was a kid. Give the guy $40 million and leave him alone, he'll give us one HELL of an action movie.
The only film of his I've seen was ONE HELL OF A CHRISTMAS - wasn't impressed. The clip for PISTOLEROS looks good, though - I'd give it shot.
Shaky Gonzalez obviously loves to crib from Robert Rodriguez's playbook. Nattens Engel featured a latino priest who took on vampires with his pistols, and now this one is chock FULL of references (or outright theft) to the Mexico trilogy. Hell, even all the music featured in that trailer is from Desperado and OUATIM. But still, it looks entertaining, to say the least.