Cassandro, True Story of Gay Exotico Saúl Armendáriz

Despite being a household sport in Mexico, lucha libre was and continues to be extremely sexist, standing for machismo and toxic masculinity. The exótico is in a unique position to challenge the toxic masculinity embedded in the competitions, particularly if the exótico performer is gay himself. Performers like Cassandro opened doors for other queer and women luchadores to join the sport, but Armendáriz battles homophobia on multiple fronts throughout the movie. The struggle to stay afloat has evidently not been easy, which is when Sabrina helps Armendáriz come up with a radical subversion of lucha libre’s stereotypical role: His character’s name is the masculine version of Cassandra, a brothel manager who Armendáriz admired.