The Return of El Coyote (1998)

A Spanish pulp adventure series from the 1940s and 1950s, unabashedly inspired by "Zorro," is the basis for this campy film with a black-masked hero called "El Coyote." The leading man here is Jose Coronado, another Spanish heartthrob who does not have the international renown of Antonio Banderas, currently starring in "The Mask of Zorro." Both films are set in 19th-century California, but while Zorro fights Spanish oppression, El Coyote takes up arms a bit later in the century, against cruel Americans. California joined the United States in 1850, and the plot's main villain is an American general who plans to steal haciendas from their rightful Hispanic owners, which include El Coyote's family. The film's charm is its attempt to re-create the style of the popular El Coyote pulp series, with grand pronouncements about pure good and pure evil, and scene changes that often look like a melodrama spoof. The endearing international cast includes the British actor Nigel Davenport as the big hacienda owner who criticizes his son for being a wimp without knowing that he is secretly the dashing, hot-blooded "El Coyote." The film does not have flashy sword fights like the current "Zorro" movie, but it shows that there is more than one way to tell a good adventure yarn.