Papi Chulo ***½ (2018, Matt Bomer, Alejandro Patiño, Elena Campbell-Martinez) – Movie Review

Matt Bomer stars in Papi Chulo (2018) as a popular and successful but lonely gay Los Angeles TV weatherman called Sean, who has a tearful breakdown on live TV and is given gardening leave to sort himself out.

Sean has a great house in the hills with a great view, but no one to share it with. We are of course going to find out why, eventually.

His first act of his compulsory vacation is to have his potted tree removed from the decking outside his home. This leaves a round unpainted patch that won’t fit in with the rest of the faded blue decking. He drives to the hardware store to pick up a tiny pot of blue paint and a tiny brush to sort it out. It looks a mess. He goes back next day to pick up a huge pot of blue paint and a big brush to sort it out.

On the sidewalk Latino migrant workers are canvassing for work. He picks up Ernesto a weather-beaten 55-year-old worker, who wants 29 dollars an hour for a paint job and hardly speaks a word of English. But Sean doesn’t care, reasoning why should Ernesto speak English if he can’t speak Spanish.

With Sean in the driving seat, an unusual friendship starts up as Sean and Ernesto go boating, Sean and Ernesto go hiking and Sean and Ernesto go to a gay couple’s house party. Ernesto looks splendidly bemused and amused. It is a masterclass in minute facial ballet by Alejandro Patiño. Bomer perhaps overdoes it as the gay Sean, but American is full of such stereotypes, and the character is tooth-achingly nice, so it is hard to be against him at all.

It starts as a bit of an interesting slow burn, but then picks up nicely, getting amusing and then funny, as well as charming and touching. The first hour is the best, which is a fairly regular pattern with films, but then the plot takes a very hard to believe tall-story direction. Sean starts to do way too much Jerry Lewis-style falling over. We know he’s in breakdown but, hey, there’s too much falling, exposing Bomer a little bit.

The film, its characters and the two main performers remain thoroughly warm and likeable though. Happy gay stories are always good to have around. Happy stories of any kind seem rare enough in the troubled atmosphere of 2018. For good measure, there is a brief but welcome appearance by Ryan Guzman as the stud Rodrigo, who turns up at Sean’s place.

Writer-director John Butler also made Handsome Devil (2016), which also has flaws and rough edges, and stretched credibility, but is also thoroughly likeable.

Matt Bomer is the 2015 Golden Globe winner for Best Performance by an Actor in a Supporting Role in a Series, Miniseries or Motion Picture Made for Television for The Normal Heart (2014). He has three children, Kit (born 2005), and twins Walker and Henry (born 2008), with his husband Simon Halls (2011 – present).

© Derek Winnert 2018 Movie Review

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