¡Casa Bonita Mi Amor!
¡Casa Bonita Mi Amor!
Eric Cartman, the obnoxious spearhead of the ‘South Park’ boys, now has a permanent table at the reimagined Casa Bonita, a quasi-Mexican restaurant in Denver, Colorado which opened its doors in 1973. Like in the 2003 episode wherein he had to risk it all in order to spend a few minutes inside this place of kitsch and undesirable chow, Trey Parker, the co-creator of the animated series, invested time and great deals of money so that, instead of just restoring it, there was something else built upon its old principles. The long, tedious (and costly) process of renovation is documented by filmmaker Arthur Bradford in his “¡Casa Bonita Mi Amor!” film.
As much a story of the transformation of a restaurant, as it is the story of a man who grew up and decided he wouldn’t mind spending a couple of bucks on constructing his own Disneyland; this humorous documentary captures the individual Parker who dedicated himself to this idea despite many red flags that indicated it would have been more prudent to pull out. The other half of the “South Park” Brain Trust—Matt Stone, doesn’t play such a big role and seems more like a good friend who is fine with backing out the financially heavy aspects of this project for Parker to pursue his dream.
Casa Bonita, with its stylized pink exterior and its suggestion of a Catholic temple that has been around for hundreds of years, was large enough to include a pool where divers could leap from cliffs to ‘perform’ as a tribute to Acapulco, mountain caves where kids could waddle around, and people straight out of a Gold Rush movie.
The atmosphere that the place emanated, more so owing to videos of its former glory, provides a sneak peek to those who have never been there.
Such memories that Polar had of wandering around this amazing – if not absurd – playground space compelled him to buy it out of bankruptcy once Covid 19 hit America in full force, although he soon realized the extent of the colossal repairs.
Even the most zealous believers, and herein, it would be useful to mention that many of the believers are the residents of Denver, concede that the cuisine, which consisted of stale, microwaved enchiladas, was almost an afterthought. At this stage in the journey, he hired Dana Rodriguez, a Mexican immigrant chef now residing in Colorado, to improve the menu. Nevertheless, there are better examples of restaurants certainly claiming to be authentic Mexican ones than Casa Bonita. Even people who should be in a position to pronounce the restaurant’s name reasonably well – standing at the reception desk, Rodriguez is a native speaker – struggle to pronounce it without nasty American twang. Intentional or not, it is rather appropriate context for a company created by white Americans with a wish to fuse the design concepts of EPCOT Mexican Pavilion, Pirates of the Caribbean, and a standard mall arcade. That is not intended in a sour sense, precisely that’s how the kitsch of the past works and is offered here.
Once, you comprehend the essence of what Casa Bonita embodies, the idea of lousy original cuisines in a place only adds to the delightful garish tackiness of the place.
The doc covers segments where Parkers takes Dana to Oaxaca regions to seek for décors, enjoy authentic cuisine, and seek inspiration occasions which never attempts to replicate the country’s cuisine but rather integrate it into the Casa Bronita fabric. It is worth mentioning one scene later on when Parker states that the 1963 Elvis Presley movie “Fun in Acapulco” is the best the house people has achieved in terms of account to the American intellectual white-wash understanding of the Mexico coolness.
In short opinion of Parker and Stone’s satirical edge, there are also less savory moments where they can clearly see the madness of the objective they are trying to achieve. And that insane, and quite possibly dumb, approach seems rather fitting for two who turned up to the Oscars high. More importantly, Bradford does includes Parker’s active participation of the finer details of the narrative’s background, particularly in the weird ‘dining establishment’ collage: the voices of new animatronics, selection of actors for ‘timeless’ parts, new taco-led puppet show. When they do display their comedic abilities, it is easy to understand why they would be perfect successors of the Casa Bonita legacy.
These creative people have the necessary funding and are able to look at the world differently; for them, the ROI is more than just a financial metric.
But the scope of the funds, which in the end amounted to more than 40 million dollars, seems to be worthy of the joy that many people feel when coming back to Casa Bonita. What’s the use of having a lot of money if one can’t spend it so that people can enjoy the childhood fantasy? Even when it feels like an extended advertisement, Bradford’s documentary manages to make you want to book a table. (There’s a queue with hundreds of thousands on the waiting list, so you will have to wait.)
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- Genre: Documentary
- Country: United States
- Director: Arthur Bradford
- Cast: Trey Parker, Matt Stone, Dana Rodriguez
