I don’t just like ‘Bob Trevino’; I absolutely love it!
It’s not hyperbole to declare “Bob Trevino Likes It” the best Facebook-adjacent movie since “The Social Network.” And like the Oscar-winner before it, “Bob Trevino” is a tale rooted in the real world yet seems too bizarre to be true. But true it is, and you can feel that authenticity in just about every frame of Tracie Laymon’s writing-directing debut. That’s because what you see, she swears happened to her after sending a “friend” request to a man she believed to be her estranged father.
Yes, the names have been changed for legal reasons, but the sentiment is genuine. It has to be because no one would dare portray their alter-ego this needy, this feckless, this desperate for human connection. She is the movie’s Lily Trevino and Lily Trevino is Tracie Laymon, stifling insecurities and all. So, one can only imagine the pressure “Euphoria’s” Barbie Ferreira must have felt portraying Tracie/Lily to this level of degradation. I mean, Laymon was right there on the set, no doubt dissecting every choice Ferreira makes in recreating her boss’s truth.
Ferreira knocks it out of the park, too, with one of the most affecting acting jobs I’ve ever witnessed. “How,” you keep asking yourself, can she allow herself to become so emotionally vulnerable, so raw? It’s practically a miracle. You feel privileged watching it unfold as Ferreira holds you so fully in her grip that you’re wracked by guilt over laughing at the patheticness of Lily’s so-called life. Yet, peeking through the misery are glimmers of the fighter, busting to burst out if only she could summon the courage.
Be assured that day will come, but she’s got a few hundred issues to work through first, beginning with her being ghosted by her father, Robert (French Stewart), after accidentally sending her two-timing dad’s latest squeeze running from a get-to-know-you dinner. Lily calls him repeatedly in the wake, leaves messages, knocks at his door, but he refuses to answer. Desperate, she tries contacting him through Facebook, clicking on a “Bob Trevino” she believes to be Pops. There’s no photo of this Bob, but why not take a shot, she says to herself, and issues the “friend” invite.
Turns out it’s a different Bob Trevino all together. In fact, as played by a never-better John Leguizamo, he’s everything her real dad is not: kind, caring, dependable and present. To her great fortune, he accepts her request and you sense it’s the start of a beautiful friendship. Initially, you worry their bond will reach romantic proportions, bracing for the unpleasant carnal knowledge between a susceptible 25-year-old female and a married, 50-something man. No worries, it is not that kind of movie. If anything, you feel small for even considering it.
Laymon depicts their friend-mance with the utmost decorum, but it doesn’t mean you won’t swoon from time to time as their surrogate father-daughter dynamic evolves. It culminates movingly when Bob introduces Lily to an adorable puppy, just like the one her real dad cruelly yanked from her arms as a child and gifted to the woman he was pursuing at the time. Losing that dog obviously still haunts Laymon, who acknowledges her lasting love for the pup in the closing credits.
In many ways, Bob is just like that dog, taken from her much too soon. But not before she learns his life has been no bowl of cherries, either. He and his wife, Jeanie (Rachel Bay Jones), are locked in grief over losing their infant son years ago. While Jeanie deals with it by burying herself in her hobby of creating elaborate scrapbooks, Bob is a workaholic and resident whipping boy for his boss on the construction site.
The fact that both Bob and Lily are in such immediate need of healing is so kismet that it would come off disingenunious if it weren’t true. Rather, it causes you to become a devout believer in the powers of fate and the kindness of strangers. Watching Bob and Lily draw strength from each other is truly inspiring. And no two people deserve a modicum of happiness more than these two.
How Laymon depicts their unique friendship should become the model for every aspiring director and some veteran ones, too. There’s a naturalness in her style and execution that enables her characters to project so achingly real it becomes less a movie and more of an eavesdrop on the messy lives of two broken yet resilient people. They forever change each other’s lives. Don’t be surprised if they also profoundly change yours.
Movie review
Bob Trevino Likes It
Rated: PG-13 for brief strong language, thematic elements
Cast: John Leguizamo, Barbie Ferreira, French Stewart, Lauren Spencer and Rachel Bay Jones
Director: Tracie Laymon
Writer: Tracie Laymon
Runtime: 101 minutes
Where: In theaters now (limited) before going wide April 4
Grade: A-
