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I won't go so far as to say I "loved" the movie, although an edit to my 2003 Top Ten list might be in order. I thought a number of things worked quite well, but (as Haggai says) there are a number of forced moments.
The beauty of this film lies in its simplicity, and that simplicity is disrupted by things like Ariel's "You aren't my daddy" outburst, Christy's "I carried this family for a year" declaration, and Johnny's afore-mentioned "I can't (whap whap whap) feel!" confrontation with Mateo. All of these instances strike me as uncharacteristic of the respective characters, and I fail to see how the first two are even necessary. Christy's address to the audience at the end also feels forced; I would have been much more pleased with closing on the emotional high of "Goodbye, Frankie."
Performances and settings are both excellent, however, and I won't hesitate to recommend it to people, as its strengths do outweigh its weaknesses (which, in my opinion, lie only in the script).
He obviously misinterpreted what it means to "be bullish."
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