Candid 'Machete' Photos Catch Glimpses of Stars

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Machete

If you spend time on Twitter, or Facebook, or have friends who like to share a lot, you may have noticed  a lot of people in downtown Austin spotting location shooting for Machete, Robert Rodriguez's latest feature currently in production. Or maybe you're one of the lucky people spotting the cameras and celebrities yourself. Since the cast includes some big-name stars (at least for Austin), it seems like more people than usual are interested.

Even if people don't know the movie by name, I'm seeing tweets like "OMG I am less than 20 feet away from Robert De Niro!" "There's a film crew across the street from my office, anyone know why?" Filming has been spotted at the Stephen F. Austin, at Congress and 11th, near the downtown Whole Foods, and in other downtown locations. Some bystanders have been taking pictures -- you can see the occasional iPhone snapshot on Twitter, but I've been able to find something a little better.

Hunting the Snark, a local gossip/celeb blog, has been following the Machete shoot closely. They linked to some photos that I traced to their source: JessicaAlba.net. The Jessica Alba fan site generously gave me permission to post a few photos from their very large set of images snapped near the Aug. 17 location shoot for Machete. They also have an article of their own about the photos.

From the above photo and an entry on Hunting the Snark, I would guess the photos were taken at 5th and Trinity. If I'm wrong, please let me know in the comments.

All the photos have Jessica Alba in them, naturally, considering the source. But I found a few with some other well-known faces as well. For example, these two photos include Danny Trejo, in the film's title role, sporting some interesting tattoos. You also can see director Robert Rodriguez in the left photo, in his customary cowboy hat.

Machete

Here's one of Alba in some very high heels, being assisted by costar Steven Seagal:

Machete

The photo on the left includes Alba and, I believe, actress Michelle Rodriguez. I included the photo on the right because it was an unusually nice one of Alba -- most of the photos in the set show her being made up, or acting, and not looking especially smiley.

Machete

For me, the interesting thing about the entire JessicaAlba.net set was that it shows how much tedious downtime can occur for actors on a movie set. It doesn't look like much fun -- Alba is standing around looking bored, or being fussed over continually by makeup artists, or checking her phone for messages. In addition, they're shooting outside in Austin and we all know that the weather has been brutally hot. I would be beet-red and drenched, but the actors all look amazingly unaffected.

If you're dying for more Machete pictures, check out a full Flickr set from HeadOvMetal, and a PopSugar article with on-set photos of Lindsay Lohan in a "nude" bikini. If you've found other pictures, please share the links in the comments.

[Photo credit: All photos are courtesy of JessicaAlba.net, used with permission from the site owner.]

Machete Pics

VERY COOL! Thanks for sharing and giving us other links to check out for more pictures.