After Robert Rodriguez made his $7,000 first film "El Mariachi" (1992) and his $3 million "Desperado" (1995), Quentin Tarantino told him they were the Mexican equivalent of Sergio Leone's first two spaghetti Westerns. After the low-budget ''A Fistful of Dollars'' and ''For a Few Dollars More,'' Leone moved up to bigger budgets for ''The Good, the Bad and the Ugly'' and ''Once Upon a Time in the West'' -- and therefore, Tarantino told his friend, Rodriguez should now make ''Once Upon a Time in Mexico.'' And so he has, for $30 million -- still a relatively modest budget, as action movies go. Advertisement