Earnest and likable, Flamin' Hot marks the big-screen directorial debut of actress Eva Longoria. It’s easy to see why the story of Richard Montanez (Jesse Garcia) appealed to Longoria. Montanez's life offers an opportunity to look at the achievements of a hard-working janitor who rose to the higher ranks of the Frito-Lay company by inventing a product (Fammin’ Hot Cheetos) and helping the company market it to a growing Hispanic audience. The marketing of any kind of Cheetos doesn’t strike me as a cause for cinematic celebration but Longoria compensates by turning Flamin’ Hot into a story of personal triumph. Garcia conquered the long odds of being poor, dabbling in the drug life, not graduating from high school, and growing up with an abusive father (Emilio Rivera). Garcia comes across as a nice guy who loves his loyal wife (Annie Gonzalez) and avidly seeks help from an engineer (Dennis Haysbert) at the Frito Lay factory where he quickly becomes a model employee. It's also refreshing to see a movie, even one with cornball tendencies, in which Mexican-American characters draw strength from their culture. If you browse the net, you'll find stories that question how Flamin' Hot Cheetos were invented. Still, I liked the characters and took the movie as an ethnically-oriented feel-good entertainment that wants to underscore the potential of workers who typically are overlooked. A proviso, though: I couldn’t suppress second thoughts about the supposed glories of snack food. To borrow and distort a famous phrase Allen Iverson used in discussing his attitude toward practice, "We're talkin' about Cheetos, man. Cheetos." *
*Full disclosure. I’m not a big Cheetos fan, but if I eat them, I prefer the original Cheetos. No Flamin' Hot Cheetos for me.
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