OUR MOVIE REVIEW:

In the nearly two decades since social media has dominated our lives, there have been countless films about it. While each one has tried to teach us something about the technology, none have actually had anything positive to say about it. For example, David Fincher’s The Social Network showed us its misguided origin. Before it was a TV show, the original Catfish documentary showed us how easy it was to use online accounts to deceive. Whether you loved it or hated it, even The Emoji Movie shows how cringe the way humans communicate has become. No film has said anything positive about social media…until now. That film is Bob Trevino Likes It.

Inspired by director Tracie Laymon’s personal experience, the film revolves around a young woman who befriends a stranger on Facebook after mistaking him for her real father. As time passes, the man becomes a genuine father figure to the woman. Whether she thinks she deserves it or not, he ultimately helps to heal her of much of the trauma she endured in life.

Laymon’s direction is great, particularly for the way in which she navigates the audience through the lives of both protagonists. That’s because it’s a reflection of the script that she wrote, which is subsequently a reflection of the story she lived firsthand. While it stands as a love letter to the stranger she connected to in real life, it is not sensationalized. Even the moments that feel too good to be true feel grounded thanks to the performances of its two stellar leads.

The incredibly versatile John Leguizamo stars as the titular Bob Trevino. While he’s built a career as a bombastic, comedic character actor, here Leguizamo delivers arguably his rawest dramatic role to date. When we first meet him, he’s a quiet man who lives a simple life with his wife. He has no adult friends. He hates confrontation. Upon befriending young Lily Trevino though, that changes. Such a small encounter creates ripple effects that force him to re-evaluate whether he’s really living or just surviving. Like the rest of the film, it’s impossible to bear witness how the relationship changes him without laughing or crying. 

As great as Leguizamo’s performance is, Barbie Ferreira shines a little bit brighter as Lily Trevino. Despite being mostly known for her two-season stint on HBO’s Euphoria, here it feels like she is finally able to spread her wings and show her range. Lily Trevino is, in all honesty, one of the saddest characters in modern movie memory. Since losing her mom at a young age, she has had no breaks from the world. She’s been forced to raise herself because her unrelenting father (the “real” Bob Trevino) is only preoccupied with finding his next female companion. In one of the film’s earliest moments, Lily actually makes a mental health advocate cry after revealing how sad her life has been. 

Ferreira is so committed to the role and selling her sadness that you can’t help but want to break through the screen and give Lily a hug. Half of the film’s satisfaction comes from how Leguizamo’s Trevino swoops in and does it for you. The other half is when Lily realizes her own self-worth, and how Ferreira helps the character find her voice. It’s not that Ferreira was born to play this character, but she understands so much of what makes Lily tick. She’s not mentally ill, but could easily be perceived as such. Yet Ferreira plays her with a certain innocence and such grace that you genuinely care about how life will turn out for her. Simply put, if there were any justice in Hollywood, this film would open the same doors that her former co-stars Zendaya and Sydney Sweeney have already walked through. 

Now, the film’s only con is its abrupt ending. Despite the climax being quite impactful to each of the characters, the audience isn’t given enough time to fully digest it. That doesn’t take away from the overall impact of the film though. 

At a time where toxicity on social media reigns supreme, Bob Trevino Likes It proves that not everything - or everyone - online is bad. While so much of our lives are lived in a digital world, it shows that the most meaningful connections are the ones we make outside of it. And it underlines just how little likes matter when there’s so much genuine love to share.