Directing: B-
Acting: B-
Writing: C
Cinematography: B-
Editing: B-

Of all the many, many movies I have watched in my life, Half Brothers is backward in a unique way. When it’s sweet, it works; but the funnier it tries to be, the less it works. It’s usually the other way around, but in this case, there is greater success when director Luke Greenfield is actually taking things relatively seriously.

A running gag involves a goat, and this is my least favorite thing about the movie. I kind of hate it. The majority of the film follows half-brothers who never knew they had the same dad, one from the U.S. and one from Mexico, on a road trip through the American Southwest. Renato (Luis Gerardo Méndez) is the successful engineer who built up a company in Mexico; Asher (Connor Del Rio) is the younger, irresponsible American who never holds down a job. Even with that in mind it makes little sense when Connor takes them sixty miles off course to tour a goat ranch and then kidnaps one, escaping with guys literally shooting at their fleeing car. The goat basically becomes a third main character from then on, designed to provide comic relief that mostly falls flat. It’s utterly pointless, and Half Brothers would have markedly improved without that stupid goat.

The goat is not the only attempt at humor that falls flat, however. A lot of it is just plain distractingly unrealistic, as when Renato and Asher happen to first cross paths in coffee shop by coincidence in Chicago, and Asher literally asks Renato, who happens to be standing behind him in line, to spot him two bucks so he can pay for the coffee he just ordered. What? Okay, the coincidental meeting I can suspend my disbelief about, but why the fuck is Asher even at a coffee shop placing orders if he has no money on him? One of the plot threads is the possibility that Asher has something mentally wrong with him, and while we are clearly meant to take that as unfair judgment against him, this behavior is strong evidence otherwise.

A peculiar case of caricature in Half Brothers is something that, upon further reflection, I have decided is kind of fair. With the exception of Asher himself, who is actually given multiple dimensions, every other American encountered in this film displays an exaggerated ignorance, all of them absolute stereotypes of fat, dumb Americans, who constantly speak slower and louder at anyone with an accent. It’s uncomfortable and objectively dumb, but . . . maybe turnabout is fair play? God knows we’ve spent a lifetime seeing movies and TV shows with Mexican characters similarly presented—Americans can take a turn for once. What I can’t decide is whether this was Greenfield’s intention, and given this film’s broader lack of sophistication, I kind of doubt it.

I also keep thinking about how these two men’s father (Juan Pablo Espinosa) never told them of each other’s existence, and sending them on this riddle-addled scavenger hunt to unlock an explanation for it all is supposed to endear them to him and forgive him his transgressions. Once you get past the “feel-good” tone of the movie, though, you might realize that their father is basically inflicting emotional abuse even after his death.

I did laugh out loud a few times. I’ll give Half Brothers that much, even though some of the time I still didn’t think the movie deserved it. Sometimes cheap shots still work, after all. I found the story much more engaging, however, when it focused on the bond Renato had with his father early in life, and on Renato and Asher’s road trip serving as a bonding experience. I’m just not sure sending them on a wild goose chase was the most rational way to make that happen.

Méndez and Del Rio’s performances as the title characters are honestly the best things about this movie, which alone make it relatively engaging. Their personalities are winning enough to make it pleasant enough to hang out with them—in spite of Renato’s exaggerated propensity for getting uptight, and Asher’s exaggerated idiocy. Everything in this movie is some level of exaggerated. Even that would be bearable if not for the script, which is just boneheaded too much of the time.

*A generous dose of Mexican-American cheese. And a goat.*

Overall: C+