If you love golf, or movies about the Mexican-American struggle in America, you'll love this move. I don't have anything emotionally invested in either and so as usual, as a big movie and history buff, I couldn't but help pick out the problems with this movie from those standpoints. And there are some problems.
There were enough historical goofs and anachronisms in this movie that I ended up starting the "Goofs" section for this movie's IMDB page with a list. Go check that section out. Some lazy screenwriting here.
From a filming standpoint there were two main problems.
First, this movie was obviously not filmed in Del Rio or anywhere close to South Texas. The scenery of what is supposed to be Del Rio in this movie is filled with rolling hills, lush green grass, and lots and lots of deciduous trees. If you are at all familiar with the different regions of Texas, this area looks like the Austin area, home to a lot of film makers. The real Del Rio, and much of South Texas, would be flat, any grass not on carefully irrigated lawns would be struggling to stay green for much of the year, and palm trees would be as common as deciduous trees in the background.
Second, the cinematography was as modernistic as the film makers could get with their budget. Lots of sweeping shots across distances that are so common and easily done these days with drone cameras. Lots of moving shots of the actors with a handheld camera, from far away to closeups. Thankfully, they used either Steadicam or optical stabilization in their cameras and so these shots didn't have that jittery handheld look that can cause motion sickness from watching the movie (the classic "Blair Witch" vomit cam). But, obviously, these very modern high tech (and now relatively cheap to do) shots take away from the historical feel of what should be a period piece set in 1956, when the only motion shots that were commonly done were on tracked dollies, and two or three camera fixed closeups were the norm. There was a section midway in the movie where the shots were reprocessed to look like the old 8mm film from that time period, I guess to throw in some of that old period piece look, but, again if you're familiar with the look of 8mm film, that was a bit too obviously reprocessed. Real 8mm film actually looks better than that segment.
So, enjoy this movie as a golf buff or a righteous warrior for Mexican American civil rights. Or, actually you can enjoy it, somewhat, to spot the film making mistakes.
There were enough historical goofs and anachronisms in this movie that I ended up starting the "Goofs" section for this movie's IMDB page with a list. Go check that section out. Some lazy screenwriting here.
From a filming standpoint there were two main problems.
First, this movie was obviously not filmed in Del Rio or anywhere close to South Texas. The scenery of what is supposed to be Del Rio in this movie is filled with rolling hills, lush green grass, and lots and lots of deciduous trees. If you are at all familiar with the different regions of Texas, this area looks like the Austin area, home to a lot of film makers. The real Del Rio, and much of South Texas, would be flat, any grass not on carefully irrigated lawns would be struggling to stay green for much of the year, and palm trees would be as common as deciduous trees in the background.
Second, the cinematography was as modernistic as the film makers could get with their budget. Lots of sweeping shots across distances that are so common and easily done these days with drone cameras. Lots of moving shots of the actors with a handheld camera, from far away to closeups. Thankfully, they used either Steadicam or optical stabilization in their cameras and so these shots didn't have that jittery handheld look that can cause motion sickness from watching the movie (the classic "Blair Witch" vomit cam). But, obviously, these very modern high tech (and now relatively cheap to do) shots take away from the historical feel of what should be a period piece set in 1956, when the only motion shots that were commonly done were on tracked dollies, and two or three camera fixed closeups were the norm. There was a section midway in the movie where the shots were reprocessed to look like the old 8mm film from that time period, I guess to throw in some of that old period piece look, but, again if you're familiar with the look of 8mm film, that was a bit too obviously reprocessed. Real 8mm film actually looks better than that segment.
So, enjoy this movie as a golf buff or a righteous warrior for Mexican American civil rights. Or, actually you can enjoy it, somewhat, to spot the film making mistakes.