The Chronicle - 'All She Can' review: A twist in sports film

Amy Biancolli, Special to The Chronicle
Published 4:00 am, Friday, September 16, 2011

 Sports drama. Directed by Amy Wendel. Starring Corina Calderon. (Not rated. 95 minutes. At Bay Area theaters.)

From its first, sweaty shots of grunting young athletes, "All She Can" looks for all the world like a conventional sports movie about a scrappy teen trying to overcome the odds. And so it is, for the next couple of reels.

Then the plot kinks in an unexpected direction, and the film becomes something else: a modest but thoughtful meditation on how (not) to self-destruct. The most important issue facing Luz, a Mexican American high school power lifter, isn't whether she'll win the Texas state championships or earn a full scholarship to the University of Texas; it's whether she'll give up trying.

The debut narrative feature from director Amy Wendel and co-screenwriter Daniel Meisel, "All She Can" stars newcomer Corina Calderon as Luz, a kid doing her best to get out of Benavides. Because Benavides is a south Texas town, the screenplay touches inevitably on the flow of immigrants at the border - and resentment at their presence. But "All She Can" puts a new face on this resentment, highlighting the frustration of legal Mexican Americans.

E-mail Amy Biancolli at [email protected]

CLICK HERE to read original article.