Director: Arthur Hiller
Cast: Alan Arkin, Rita Moreno, Reuben Figueroa, Miguel Alejandro

As you no doubt know, there are some really great challenges in life. Everybody has their own unique challenges to deal with; my present challenges include going to work every day, paying all my bills on time, maintaining and regularly updating this very website, and trying to get into the thick skulls of Canadian filmmakers the truth that their taste in films is nowhere near the taste of any member of the Canadian public - or the public of any other country, for that matter. There is one particular challenge that I haven't had (and probably never will) in my life that most people on this planet will have to face, a challenge that has been one of the greatest for mankind for thousands of years. That particular challenge is raising children. Sure, it is easy (and quite fun) to get into the process of making a child, but once that child is born, you will have a heck of a lot of things you'll have to provide for your child for the next eighteen years (nineteen in some Canadian provinces.) Some of the most obvious things you'll have to provide include a steady supply of nutritious food, and some kind of roof over your child's head. You'll also have to provide adequate medical care, and "adequate" could be a nightmare if your child is born with or eventually develops some major kind of health ailment. You'll also have to make sure that your child also gets the education he or she needs.... though if you think you'll get a pass if your child decides to drop out of high school, you'll probably find that your uneducated child will eventually bring some new and real problems for you, such as leeching off of you until you can legally throw that bum kid of yours out onto the street permanently.

Some parents can't clearly fulfill all of those demands of raising a child. No doubt you have heard many times of parents abandoning or abusing their child - such sad things have surely happened since the first humans started raising children. But I am sure most parents do their very best to make sure their sons and daughters are raised correctly so that they are ready once they reach adulthood and leave the family home. There are certainly cases when parents go beyond what most parents would do for their children. I want to talk about one specific example of this. If you were alive during the early 1990s, you probably heard of the true-life story of Elian González. For those that didn't know, González was a six-year-old Cuban boy whose mother decided to flee Cuba with him and make the dangerous trip across the Straits of Florida in order for the two of them to make it to the United States and have a better life there. During the trip, González's mother drowned, and he was rescued by fishermen and taken to Florida to recuperate and live with a distant relative. However, González's father, who was still alive and living in Cuba, wanted his son back. What followed was a very bitter international custody case, as well as further straining relationships between Cuba and the United States; Fidel Castro himself made it clear he was upset with things like González getting presents from American well-wishers as well as with Americans saying that Gonzalez would be better off in America. Eventually, the courts dictated that González must be returned to Cuba, and he was. Years later, when González was an adult in Cuba, he publicly stated that his time in America was a very sad time for him, and even back then he had the right to be Cuban and live a Cuban way.

Of course, you have to wonder if González really meant the words he said, given the countless reports of the Cuban government suppressing and manipulating its citizens. As well, I don't think González has (correct me if I'm wrong) ever discussed the issue as to why his mother in the first place thought it would be best to risk their lives to flee Cuba to live in America. Anyway, with that true-life situation that I've just told you about, you no doubt see that some extreme measures that parents do for their children don't exactly immediately suggest that a movie dealing with the particular extreme measures would be a gold mine for light-hearted entertainment. Yet the movie that I am reviewing here - Popi - promised to do that when I found it online. Not only that, the parent in this movie decides the particular extreme measure he'll do for his children is not that far removed from what happened in the González case! True, Popi was made earlier and long ago in a simpler time, but see what you think of the following plot synopsis for the movie. In New York City, there is a Puerto Rican man called Abraham "Popi" Rodriguez (Alan Arkin, Inspector Clouseau), a widower who has the task of raising his two young sons Luis and Junior. Although Abraham has in his life a sweetheart named Lupe (Rita Moreno, West Side Story) who gives him a lot of love and support, Abraham has to deal with all sorts of challenges to raise his sons in the right way, from working at multiple jobs to earn money to making sure his sons stay away from the criminal element in his neighborhood. It eventually gets to be too much, but around this time Abraham is stricken with an idea. Learning that refugees from Cuba are welcomed to America and get plenty of help and benefits, he decides that the best course of action would be to travel to Florida with Luis and Junior, let them loose in the middle of the ocean in a rowboat, and have them picked up and determined to be Cuban refugees by the American government. Then his sons will be adopted by white upper-class people and live the rest of their childhoods in comfort.

Although long time readers of The Unknown Movies will probably have concluded by now that it takes a lot for a movie to shock or offend me, most (if not all) of them may all the same understand why the premise of Popi made me feel very uncomfortable, both before watching it and while watching it. If not, let me explain. The movie's idea of a Puerto Rican man deciding in fairly quick notice that abandoning his kids to be taken care of by Caucasian upper-class types was offensive for me in more than one regard. First of all, any man who decides to let go of his kids forever in just a few heartbeats - even if it's an attempt to give them a good life - seems unbelievably cold-hearted to me. The second reason why this premise bothered me was that it suggested that anyone in a minority group, Puerto Rican or otherwise, depending on Caucasians to save them from a big predicament just comes across as insulting to that minority group, essentially saying that minorities can't help themselves or others in their group. But the offensiveness doesn't just stop with those two points that I made. Over the course of the movie, Abraham's plan forms into a scheme that puts his two children into serious danger for an extended period, and that comes across as even more cold-hearted. But it's not just the basic premise that I had a problem with, but with some messages the movie suggests during its 113-minute running time. I could go at length listing the tone-deaf messages the movie suggests, but I'll just list the biggest one, that being the movie suggests that for certain people, a chance of getting the American Dream is practically an impossibility. In real life it certainly may be harder or even very hard for some people to achieve that dream, but in Popi, the harsher message is hammered home countless times. Abraham gets one scene where he talks at length to Lupe about this, and Lupe isn't given a chance to provide some counter arguments.

To be fair, a couple of times earlier in the movie, Lupe does suggest that she, Abraham, and his kids simply move to a better place in the district of Brooklyn, but Abraham each time immediately shoots down the idea, and without getting into why he feels the idea won't work. As it turns out, the character of Lupe doesn't really get a chance to influence the narrative or other characters, maybe explaining why halfway through the movie her character simply disappears with no explanation, and is never brought up again. That just leaves Abraham and his two kids for the movie to focus on. The two kids do come across pretty realistically, I admit, whether the situation is joyous or (for the most part) painful. Just about all of their painful moments come from their father Abraham, who comes across as one of the more despicable parents I have seen in a motion picture. In the role, actor Alan Arkin for 95% of the time comes across as purely furious. Yes, he says several times he is concerned for the upbringing of his two children, but even in those "quieter" moments he comes across as barely holding back his rage. And when he lets go and is at full throttle, oh boy, watch out. He screams at his children, slaps them around, and when they approach him with tears in their eyes and plead for him to stop his crazy plan to abandon them, there are no cracks in his furious facade. Near the end of the movie, he does finally break down in deep emotion, but I simply couldn't buy it after showing no love or compassion for his children up to that point. With such a one-note character being pushed and kept on him by director Arthur Hiller (The In-Laws), it's no surprise that Arkin can't seem to do all that much to give Abraham any dimension, even that of being an angry but interesting person. In the end, the only thing that Arkin manages to succeed at doing is giving his character one of the most unconvincing Puerto Rican accents you have ever heard.

Another big problem with Popi is that it doesn't seem to know what kind of movie it wants to be. While the movie advertises itself to be aimed at a family audience (it got a G rating at the time, believe it or not), the movie isn't just an exercise in showing moment after moment of Abraham's rage, but the movie throws in nudity and some language (including homophobic slurs) that would rate it much higher by itselves today. Raising the rating even more to what I think should be a PG-13 are some harsh moments for the characters, ranging from Abraham being chased and beaten to a pulp by a street gang, but also his two children being terrorized by a gang that strips them naked and burns all of their clothes. (The kids are understandably traumatized by this, but then they and their father suddenly forget this all happened for the rest of the movie.) I will say that all the moments taking place in the Puerto Rican neighborhood feel real; there is real grit and filth, as well as an unchoreographed feeling that makes you believe this urban ghetto lifestyle really existed like this back in 1969. On the other hand, there are moments in Abraham's day to day life that are right out of a silent film comedy, like when he tries to fix a flooded basement without getting his shoes wet (he puts his feet in buckets), or when one rainy night the ceiling of his apartment starts leaking, and he has to bring an umbrella with him when he uses the toilet. But even if these and other attempts at comedy in Popi were not surrounded by the grim material I earlier mentioned, I don't think I or anyone else would be laughing at them. The comic touches instead feel forced, and even with a tinge of sadness to them. Needless to say, they don't really mix with the harsh reality that is often showcased in the movie. By now you should realize that Popi is completely inappropriate for younger kids, and that older children and adults will be almost as uncomfortable as their younger relatives. While it's possible that afficionados of really strange and misguided movies might get something from watching it, the movie's constant meanness and heartlessness may even make them pause occasionally and ask themselves if it's really worth watching it right to the end.

(Posted July 18, 2023)