Paper ‘Machete’

All films start out as trailers, but Machete really began life as a trailer, a faux-grindhouse preview for a film that did not exist as part of Quentin Tarantino and Robert Rodriguez’s double-bill schlock explosion that was Planet Terror and Death Proof. New on DVD this week, the over-the-top Tejano bloodbath that was the Machete trailer proved so popular among fans that Rodriguez is back with a feature-length film to match. Danny Trejo stars as the titular ex-federale who launches a war of revenge against his former boss. Rodriguez has roped in an impressive cast of A-list to C-list character actors, including Robert DeNiro, Cheech Marin, Lindsay Lohan, Michelle Rodriquez, Don Johnson and Jessica Alba to bring his gritty, scene-chewing vision to kitschy, screaming life. Rated R.