This is largely Bomer’s show, but it’s not a good showcase for his dramatic and comedic chops. The more that “Papi Chulo” tries to frame the friendship as quirky and not clearly one-sided, it gets even worse. "Papi Chulo" gets even more ridiculous when Sean later tries to track down Ernesto, and it's simply obnoxious that he considers Ernesto enough of a friend to constantly talk at him about his problems, but not enough to have his cell phone number, and also that Sean treats the outside of the hardware store as if it were Ernesto’s home. And he’s wrong about this friendship in so many ways-the viewer knows this, but we’re not sure the script does until the very end-and it's disheartening to watch, scene by scene. Sean is even defensive in an earlier scene when someone remarks that they have “a ‘Driving Miss Daisy’ thing” going on after Ernesto rows a sleepy Sean around Echo Park. But Sean doesn’t fully grasp the situation or its optics, and frustratingly, neither does "Papi Chulo." It's a bonding activity, Sean thinks, even though Ernesto knows he is getting paid for this diversion from painting the deck. Ernesto just sits there, half-smiles, and Sean rambles on. Ernesto can share how many children he has, because Sean knows some numbers in Spanish, but that’s pretty much it. As the needy Sean takes his new companion Ernesto through recognizable landmarks like Echo Park, Sean talks at Ernesto about his problems, treating him like the therapist he should have seen long ago. “Papi Chulo” is a buddy comedy, but only by its ramshackle design-it’s a forced friendship, and it’s not cute, let alone funny. It’s only a semblance of trust in humanity that makes one think "Papi Chulo" agrees with you as to how gross all of this looks. In a tone-deaf meet-cute, Sean goes to the hardware store and meets his new pal Ernesto outside ( Alejandro Patiño) while other migrant workers surround Sean's car. When Sean has it removed, a big sunspot is revealed underneath, and Sean has to go and get paint, but he doesn’t want to do the painting himself. The incident causes him to leave the job for a while, and we find out that it’s related to sadness for a past partner named Carlos, who left behind only a tree on the back deck. Written and directed by John Butler, the story comes with an undeveloped dark side-we’re introduced to Matt Bomer’s weatherman Sean as he fails to hold it together on camera, having a live meltdown. In the case of "Papi Chulo," this one is about a depressed, upper middle-class white man named Sean, who meets an immigrant worker named Ernesto outside a hardware store, and pays Ernesto to spend time with him. John Butler’s grating “Papi Chulo” manages to out-“ Green Book” the Best Picture-winner when it comes to teeth-gnashing racial dynamics and ham-fisted sentimentality, its story built around a white person’s epiphany about those who look different than him.
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