In director Jacques Tourneur's 1947 film noir classic "Out of the Past," Robert Mitchum plays a gas station attendant inexorably drawn back into his dangerous past, a descent into tragedy that begins with a trip to Acapulco, where he first encounters femme-fatale Jane Greer in a dusty, run-down cantina just off the Zocalo, near the center of town. For most Americans, I suspect this was their first glimpse of Acapulco, then  a sleepy, thoroughly Mexican fishing village whose gorgeous bay was full of more fishing boats than pleasure craft and whose beaches were more populated by drying nets than sunbathers. It was a place you went seeking oblivion, where you could be sure not to run into anyone you knew.
    Fast forward to 1963 to "Fun in Acapulco," starring Elvis Presley. Certainly the only good things about the movie, apart from a chance to see the young Elvis in a Speedo, are the location shots of the town,  then becoming a popular but still relatively low-key and lightly populated beach resort. The center of things remained Playa Caleta and the other beaches surrounding the Zocalo in what is now called "Old Acapulco."   
   When I first visited Acapulco in 1983, it was hot, crowded, and  smelling of car fumes. Eden had fled long ago. The center of town had moved east to the Costera Miguel Alleman, where bands of young men aggressively hawked time-shares in large high-rise hotels and condos either recently finished or still under construction. The endless sunshine and the cool waters of the beautiful bay just a block off the Costera still drew busloads of tourists, but pollution was a problem. The whole place felt run-down and past its prime.
    But in the last decade, development has increased dramatically. At least a dozen new skyscrapers crowd together on the Costera, down towards the once solitary Naval Station, and somehow even more cars have been squeezed onto the narrow streets. Construction sites are everywhere. The town now has a dynamic feel to it, but the racket and congestion can be overwhelming.
   In early March, party-hearty spring breakers from El Norte arrive as well,  but fortunately, 20 minutes from the grit, crowds, and pavement are three first-rate hotels-- the Fairmont Acapulco Princess (866-385-0256; 435-627-0503), the Pierre Marques (866-385-0256; 435-627-0503), and the Playa Revolcadero (74/69-10-00; 800/223-1818).  The Princess is a huge, a thousand rooms, offering guests just about every amenity and pastime, as well as a level of luxury few other local hostelries can claim. The main building is shaped like an Aztec pyramid topped with a large frieze of glyphs. The breezy, open-air lobby is a soaring, hanging-garden style atrium, opening directly onto acres of lush tropical gardens set with tall palms. Six restaurants and 4 large pools, including one shaped like a jungle lagoon complete with rope bridge, white swans, and a pair of pink (really, vivid orange) flamingoes, are right at hand.
    Just down the beach, however, lies my own favorite hotel, the Pierre Marques, originally built by J .Paul Getty in the 50's as a retreat for family and friends, who must have been numerous. Mr Getty hired the architects and approved the blueprints, but never actually stepped foot in the place. The story goes that halfway through construction, his yacht did anchor just beyond the surf so that J. Paul could see how construction was progressing, but that was as close as he ever got.  Actually, one of Getty's original guests still spends a few months of the year here, and has for over 40 years. It's easy to see why, for it's more like being a guest in someone's house, albeit a very  large one, than staying at a hotel. Done in an elegant, understated, '50's low-rise style, the hotel provides accommodations either in the 3-story main building or in roomy villas (left) situated among well-tended gardens. Guests are welcomed in an open-air lobby done simply in marble and local stone, with three cobalt blue reflecting pools and the beach to the rear.  Our villa had a large bedroom/living room, complete with sofa and dining table for four. A wall of French doors opened out onto a small patio facing the gardens, a very pleasant to sit  over morning coffee or cocktails in the evening.
     Day and night here, you're about as far from the boisterous  "center of things" as you can get. Lazing on chaises around one of the pools or under one of the mesh "tents" set up on the sand seems the appropriate thing to do, especially since an almost constant cool, refreshing breeze blows in off the water. At night, the deserted chaises by the pool are perfect for star-gazing, or quiet têtes-a-têtes.
    The most formal dining room at the Pierre Marques is Tabachin,  on two levels, with small sofas, and comfortable armchairs. With its spacious, well-dressed tables, the room is accented with dark exotic woods, deep, rich earth-tones and a handful of beautiful paintings (right). Soft, indirect lighting flatters guests and decor equally, and provides diners with a setting worthy of the food that follows.   
   Chef Gino Guercio's soul is solidly in the Mediterranean, but he likes to add Asian touches to keep things light, lively, and up-to-date for his international clientele.  I love a well-made stock, and his Asian chicken consommé is refinement itself, deeply flavored yet delicate, subtle yet satisfying, needing no more than a small chicken raviolo and a few shiitake mushrooms to make it very special.  His crab wonton is crisp, greaseless, filled with sweet crab, and served with an excellent sour apple and mango chutney. Other wonderful items include  smoked duck breast salad; pan-seared sea scallop with a roasted red bell pepper confit; and  a cold water prawn tempura served with delicious avocado ratatouille, a zingy ponzu sesame seed dressing, and a Japanese dipping sauce.
    If you're in the mood for a steak, order the napoleon  of filet mignon layered with a slab of foie gras, a crispy potato-and-shiitake cake, and a sprinkling of woodland mushrooms, all bathed in a rich Port wine reduction. Seafood is equally well turned out, whether a pan-seared red snapper filet, served on a bay scallop, roasted cherry tomato risotto, or Pacific sea bass with a tapenade crust, sun-dried tomato-polenta cake, and a sweet red pepper coulis.  Guercio uses superb Mexican chocolate (you can still have it ground to order in small storefronts in Oaxaca)  and even foie gras, now being produced in Baja, which  also supplies some quite satisfying Mexican wines, such as the merlot from Monte Xanic.
    For dessert five differently flavored crème brûlées --vanilla, mango, coffee, chocolate, and pistachio-- come  in small Asian spoons.   Also wonderful were a homemade passion fruit sorbet served beside a deep green mint one, and my favorite, a silky white chocolate and lime mousse. 
    First courses here range from $8.50 to $23.50, and  entrees $17.50 to $37.50.

  The hotel's Terrazza  is a beach-loving gourmand's dream. Adjacent to both beach and pool, this open-air, tile-floored dining spot provides needed relief from the sun in both its main dining area, cooled by ceiling fans, and on its shade-dappled patio covered by an arbor of dense, flowering bougainvillea. Start with the plate of Mexican tapas, like shrimp quesadillas, mini-tacos, and ham and cheese burritos piled around a mound of wonderful guacamole with tortilla chips. An excellent seviche  arrives in a sauce made from tomatoes, onions, olives, fresh coriander, and the obligatory lime juice, which helps to "cook" the raw fish. Red snapper and Pacific sea bass make for delicious entrees, the former made a la talla, that is,  cooked on a grill, and  served with refried beans, corn tortillas, and a small salad;  the latter is roasted, with a warm balsamic vinegar dressing, mushroom risotto, and a couple of those flavorful grilled Mexican shrimp thrown in to gild the lily. Appetizers here run: $4.50-$11.50, entrees $9 to $20.50.   

    Worthy of your best resort wear is Veranda, located a short shuttle ride away at the Princess. This cavernous Italian restaurant is divided up into several different spaces, one containing an antipasto bar and dessert buffet of a kind you'll find in fine restaurants in Italy. Avoid the section underneath the fluorescent bulbs; opt instead for the more romantic ambiance of the candle-lit tables overlooking  overlook the illuminated beach illuminated.
    Chef Tony Parente brings considerable gusto to this corner of the Mexican Pacific. His vitello tonnato was wonderful, a quatrefoil of overlapping slices of veal, still  pink, centered on a perfect square of the tuna sauce. A sprinkling of capers and a drizzle of extra-virgin olive oil complete the dish. Equally simple and delicious were the tonno marinato, a perfect carpaccio of tuna marinated with olive oil and topped with a mini-salad Niçoise.
     Fresh pappardelle are served with a pink cream sauce containing shrimp and porcini. Other pastas include potato gnocchi with beef ragù, besciamella,  and a crust of melted provolone with just the right sharpness to cut through the richness of the dish.   A grilled tuna "mignon" on a bed of caponata and a seared filet of sea bass were done to a turn.
      Parente is rightly proud of his mele in prigione , a wonderful apple financiére with a scoop of vanilla ice cream; rich, dark, molten chocolate cake; and a hazelnut opera cake with Frangelico and white chocolate mousse.
A couple of glasses of Prosecco were all that was needed to round out this fine  meal.
      Antipasti are $9.50, pastas $15.50 to $ 18.50, and main course $17 to $26. 
    
   Located steps from the beach, underneath a magnificent, monumental palapa, the Beach Club (below) is all about relaxed, casual dining,  just the kind of eatery a shore vacation calls for, with no pretensions, no frou-frou, and no dressing-up, just strong, uncomplicated flavors and the simplest of preparations.
    Enormous wicker lampshades hung on thick macrame cords sway in the ocean breezes, and one could easily spend the best part of an afternoon here, cooling-off, while noshing, sipping, enjoying the view and listening to live music. Stick to the basics and you can't go wrong:  ceviche de pescado was  as good as it gets, with chunks of shrimp, squid, scallops and red snapper awash in a spicy red marinade tingling with lime juice. If you can't decide on just one starter, order the Mexican tapas (below), which include mini- chalupas with baby shark, chicken satay with peanut sauce, and mini- crab cakes.  The  club sandwich was also a success with turkey, lettuce and tomato, and  heavily-smoked Mexican bacon.    
     Two good entrees are both simply grilled fish, either huachinango (red snapper)  with a simple brown butter sauce, or filet de robalo (sea bass) that came with a mildly spicy, delicious ajillo sauce, the color of a brand new fire truck.  The cooks might have done with something better on the side than a pile of white rice and  steamed vegetables.
   
  

           

To visitAcapulco and not dine at Baikal (above) is to miss one of the town's great culinary experiences. Your taxi drops you off halfway down the aptly named Avenida Escenica, the last steep hill leading into town, at a nondescript patch of blacktop. At its center sits a palm leaf-roofed pagoda of glass above a small circular pond lit by a handful of flaming torches. On the edge of the parking lot, a small monolith with "Baika" written across it in neon tells you this is the right place. You start down a grand, sweeping, and dramatically-lit staircase worthy of Golden-Age Hollywood into an elegant white and beige supper club as beautiful as it is theatrical, with a 20-foot  high wall of sheer glass overlooking the bay. A million lights of Acapulco across the bay make for a breathtaking spectacle, especially if you have a table right up against the windows. 
           As if all this spectacle weren't enough, once each hour large screens descend part of the way down the windows, while colorful videos of sea-life--dolphins playing on the surface, schools of brightly colored tropical fish, octopuses gliding chameleon-like through the depths--are shown.
    All this ambience gets pricey" Appetizers top out at $52 and entrees at $60, but most of the former are between $15 and $25 dollars, the latter $25 to 35. Could the food, however, live up to this glamorous setting and million- dollar view? Well, not always, but often enough. Black bean soup with a slice of foie gras ($14) was perfectly fine, even if it could have used a little salt to liven it up. Our other appetizer did indeed live up to the view: Lobster "salad," composed of one-and-a half lobster tails and some claw meat arrived in a delicate brown butter and balsamic vinaigrette,  mildly sweet/sour from the vinegar, and served with a small salad of baby lettuces. It was well worth a $32 tab. Red snapper with tapenade was delicious, as was grilled sea bass, though both would have been better without their utterly mundane sides of wild and long-grain rice pilaf, and a handful of steamed vegetables.
     What better than soufflés to finish off dinner in this gorgeous retro setting?  Both the rich, dark chocolate and the more delicately perfumed Grand Marnier soufflés were perfect examples of the genre, and tasted every bit as good as they looked.

      Buddha wrote that, "Whoever lives only for pleasures, with senses uncontrolled, immoderate in eating, lazy, and weak, will be overthrown by Mara (ruler of desire and death), like the wind throws down a weak tree."  Which doesn't seem to bother  anyone crowding into Megu to drink signature cocktails and order up platters of sushi and Kobe beef.  Still, the most notable design element in this, the most dramatic new restaurant in NYC,  is a huge Buddha ice sculpture (left) that slowly melts throughout the evening and is recreated the next day, which I think is a nice  Zen-like acknowledgment of the impermanence of the material world.
    Other than that, Megu could easily have served as the set for the restaurant scene in "Kill Bill, Vol. I" where Uma Thurman, in a really cool yellow gym suit, dispatches a few hundred Japanese guys with her gleaming samurai sword. 
  Megu (which means "blessing" in Japanese) is set on two levels and 13,000 square feet of shadowy space.  A huge bronze bonsho bell (a replica of one hanging in Kyoto's Higashi Honganji temple) hangs in the main dining room, the lounge walls are covered with kimono fabrics (very, very beautiful), and the central columns are said to be constructed from white ceramic rice bowls, sake pitchers and soup bowls. The waitstaff is dressed in pajama-like outfits favored by samurai. There is even a sake sommelier.
    The $6 million space, designed by Yasumichi Morita,  is dynamic and sexy, so, as you might imagine, it is also very, very loud, with 120 speakers set around the space. The menu is enormous, going from category to category, and owner Koji Imai, who plans to have 30 restaurants under his aegis by year's end, insists he brings in only the very finest ingredients from all over the world. Supposedly the chef even brings in his ice from Japan. Whatever.
     The proof of all this planning is, of course, in the food, and Imai makes a point of not hyping any of the 25 cooks who work here at various stations. The menu is not so much confusing as it is exhausting, page after page after page of various styles of Japanese cuisine.   A category called "Crown Gems Supreme" reads like a Shinto text: "MEGU’S Hon Maguro, the finest blackfin tuna, is sourced from the best waters around the world. In our relentless pursuit of the finest quality ingredients, we air-ship the tuna the day it is caught. `Noten Top Toro' Tartare with Caviar ($36); Noten-toro, from the nape of the tuna neck, is exceptionally smooth and prized, as each tuna yields only a gem-sized portion A glistening mold of melt-in-your-mouth noten top toro, crowned with delectable caviar. The pairing perfectly enhances noten top toro’s subtle umami Hon Maguro Chu Toro & Wasabi Avocado Sauce, Ravioli Style ($38). Meltingly tender cubes of lightly marbleized chu toro are briefly seared to seal in their umami, then marinated in MEGU’s own garlic soy sauce. Sliced sashimi style to reveal its rare center, the toro’s abundant umami complements creamy avocado slices Enjoy with avocado sauce pungent with fresh wasabi A Royal Pairing of Chu Toro Tataki with Noten Top Toro ($45); The finest hon maguro toro is seared to seal in its tender umami, then sliced into slender sashimi slices. Each slice is crowned with a noten top toro puree, infused with garlic-soy. Experience this twin toro indulgence as it melts into your mouth."  This can get a little tedious, but push on.
   "Crown Jewels" are the most extravagant items on the menu, like toro steak with white truffle oil ($100); sake-steamed wild black abalone with ganseki sauce ($100); and Kobe beef chateaubriand with fresh wasabi and sake juices ($180).  The very extensive appetizer menu, "Gems from Japan," includes shell-roasted Princess Sazae conch, with snail butter ($20); Kumamoto oysters grilled "on a River Stone" ($28);  Madai sashimi salad with sizzling sesame oil ($28), and many more.  The sushi here is of superb quality. When available there are Japanese smelts with their roe. The Grill menu offers free-range chicken and grass-fed lamb, along with cubes of Kobe beef. The animal is supposedly massaged and listens to Mozart all day, which sounds like a swell way to spend your life if at the end of it you going to be grilled over charcoal and served with four sauces.
    There are also soups and noodles and an array of better-than-usual French-accented Japanese desserts, including bitter chocolate soufflé with warm Ogura Azuki cream; Sencha-flavored custard served with vanilla-based Sencha sauce; and fruit tart baked with almond cream and seasonal fruits.
      I was very impressed with the quality of food and cooking at Megu, not least because it takes such an enormous effort to pull it all off for so many people each night; the place seats 205 and does multiple turn-overs.  The only question is the price: When you choose from this category and that, this page and another, sharing plates of sushi and Kobe beef--in most cases small portions--the bill can mount fearfully.  Indeed, you could as easily spend as much money here as you would for a 20-course meal at Masa (reviewed here at http://pages.prodigy.net/johnmariani/040801/ ), which runs $300 and up.   So watch out for Mara.
     

OUR KIND OF WOMAN

"Sure, I have to watch what I eat. We all do.  But I don't even know what the South Beach diet is.  To me it sounds like margaritas on the beach.  That would be a good diet!"--Catherine Zeta-Jones, in Instyle (July 2004).