Blending excellent reporting and strong storytelling, this is a disturbing film truly stranger than fiction

Easily the biggest piece of Right wing non sense propaganda I ever saw.

Great story, amazing characters, superb action, enthralling cinematography. Yes, this is something I am glad I spent money on.

By the time the dramatic fireworks start popping off, each one feels earned.

This is one of the most unusual films I have ever seen. Director Bob Cawley tried many intriguing things in telling basically a very predictable story of greed and sexual tension destroying a group of four's journey to cross the border, find and take 17 tons of gold from a Mexican village. It has a host--which instantly reminded me of that suave spokesman for those foreign beer commercials--and had at least two of the main actors act as narrators, so that you could tell what they were thinking. It was zero-budget, but had some bizarre aspects of filmmaking which I found quite admirable, a few ideas that really worked and made the otherwise forgettable story worth watching. There were a few things I could certainly glean and learn from, and put someday in a film I made, should at some point in the future, I was blessed to make cinematic artwork for the world to see. In my opinion, to get your ideas from your mind, and to do everything necessary to make a lasting 60-120 minute visualization of them, is the pinnacle of the living experience and the highest honour one can achieve, at least in this world.

Another Mill Creek Drive-in 50-pack film. This one should be retitled to "Garbage of Tayopa" -- it's completely garbage. 100% trash not one thing salvageable about this snooze-fest.Z-grade acting. Almost anyone can do this film because acting talent is not what they were looking for - everything sounds staged and phony. The one scene with the sun glaring in the camera seemed to drag on and on... time filler I would guess.This is the most boring treasure hunt you can watch. You are much better off gathering up your family and friends to treasure hunt in your back yard - you'd have more fun than watching this dreary film.1/10

Treasure of Tayopa is about four people who go on an expedition in Mexico in search of lost gold. The group consists of a no nonsense female leader, an exposition-spouting older man, a long haired hothead called Sally and a Mexican side-kick. It's a real obscurity and a bit of an oddball movie overall. Much of its strangeness is on account of how shabbily it has been brought to the screen. Its poorness in most areas has resulted in a film with a somewhat strange ambiance.It could best be described as a semi-western adventure film. But it's quite difficult becoming very involved with the mission itself as it's never exactly very well presented. In fact, it's more than a little boring for much of the time unfortunately. Events are enlivened, however, with some scenes of excessive violence committed by the character Sally, who turns out to be a bit of a psychopath, albeit a somewhat annoying one. His crimes include doubling back to massacre a group of Mexicans for a decidedly minor infraction and administering a bloody whipping to the leading lady. As I say, it's all rather strange but it does feature some decent folk rock on the soundtrack, of a type that I am quite partial to. On the whole, this is one only for the most intrepid cinema fan.

Joking aside, this is a competently made, if rather low budget, thriller about a bunch of gringos (and Fillipe) who trek off into the Sierra Madres in search of . . . the treasure of Tayopa. Duh. Despite the cowboy hats and six-shooters it's less of a western and more of a '70s survivalist movie, with Trapani stealing the show as crazy ass Sally . . . though all of the actors are good, especially Rena Winters, who I could swear I've seen elsewhere, though the IMDb lists this as her sole credit. Numerous spoilers follow.After being introduced to our main characters the film jumps into a bit of back story, with "host/star" Gilbert Roland's narration accompanied by murals of the (fictional?) 17th century Tayopa mission, where Jesuit priests mined gold until they were massacred by Indians. Quickly enough we segue back into our tale, where, as already mentioned, Sally proves himself to be one messed upped mutha, coming on to Rena with increasing frequency and intensity, harassing Fillipe the guide, and locking horns with the ineffectual Stoppard. Along their merry way to Tayopa Sally murders some bandito types ("They pushed my horse - nobody does that" is a cheesy line, but Trapani made me believe it), resulting in the party being stalked by the ruffians' former employer, a sinister looking fellow dressed all in black. And he has a scar. But he's nice to his horse. Upon reaching their destination Sally snaps completely, attempts to rape Rena, kills Stoddard and Fillipe, and finally dies laughing maniacally, after his head is bashed in with a rock. The sinister fella only shows up to witness the aftermath. He is NOT the villain of the piece after all, despite what Mill Creek's product write up states. Really, most of the action centers on Rena and Sally, as individuals and as antagonists to each other. Rena shows herself as particularly resilient, at one point eating raw rattlesnake to stave off death, only after crawling out of a creek half-drowned and covered in welts. In her dying moments, she hallucinates (as I interpreted it) a priest, who offers her water. She dies. The end.After all that unpleasantness, Roland again addresses the audience, restating his assertion that "Tayopa's past will continue to drive people to search today, and plan to search for tomorrow." ---Spoilers end---Despite its low budget, Treasure of Tayopa makes good use of editing techniques and cinematography. I really can't see why it's as obscure as it is, or why nobody connected to it went on to bigger and better things.