I gave this movie about an hour and I just couldn’t continue. I knew things weren’t going to improve as I kept pausing the movie to do other things, and I kept forgetting what it was called. The reasons why I gave this random movie a shot was it was a holiday movie. I find movies that are seasonal can be fun just because it has a built in theme to it. Also, I was surprised at all of the great actors in it like Alfred Molina, Elizabeth Pena, John Leguizamo, Freddy Rodriguez, and Debra Messing. The movie centres around a Puerto Rican family in Chicago and the fall out from an unexpected divorce announcement from the family’s matriarch and patriarch.
I like little films like this that give a little sneak peek into the lives of a family that is not a bland white bread one that you’re used to always seeing. But what I don’t like is when these films either on purpose or not, seem to come off too heavy handed in proving how authentic it is to its ethnic roots. It’s like okay, we don’t need to see more than one actor in a wife beater and underwear. We get it. That’s probably a thing in this household. What I do want to see more of is how the dad is doing his immigrant working class best to understand how to run his business and make a profit.
I really liked the scene where the dad shows his son how he was able to reduce the cost of pork by 3 cents using a software program. I can relate to this because many members of my family own or have owned their own businesses, but did it all through street smarts. I’m certain they probably ran into the same barriers where they may not know how to use the fancy computer software or even understand how to do those complicated pricing and forecasting formulas that you learn in business school. But they somehow were able to wing it and make it through.
What I didn’t like was the mandatory out of touch “white” character who marries into the family. In this case, it’s Debra Messing who plays Sarah and is married to the eldest and successful Wall Street-ish son, Mauricio (Leguizamo). You know this movie is going to go downhill into a caricature pit when Sarah shows up at the family home with a Blue Tooth phone device thing attached to her ear.
The film was released in 2008, so I think that was still an era where films that were about ethnic families still were heavy on the stereotypes, but I still couldn’t take it. However, I thought the film had its moments especially when it is Sarah who decides to stay and support Mauricio’s mom when she announces she is divorcing his father.
Whether a movie is about a white family or a Puerto Rican family or an alien family, I just want to see typical but realistic emotions and moments. I didn’t understand why the family get together was being crashed by random extra characters. And maybe it’s just a little bit of a stretch for the three kids to have such different careers and lives. One is a businessman. One is a soldier. And one is a Hollywood actress. It just seems too far-fetched.
The actors don’t have a lot of chemistry with each other and ultimately the story just falls flat. And excellent cast and a great premise, but I wish it went a different route.
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