Giovanni Solano, Editor-In-Chief
Pixar’s latest film was released over the Thanksgiving weekend, and it is a delightful and charming film that’s well worth watching.
That would normally go without saying, but recently Pixar has been missing the mark with some of their movies– The Good Dinosaur and Cars 3 being notable culprits.
But any ill will earned from those duds is forgotten after watching Coco. If Coco doesn’t bring you to tears, it’s going to bring you close to tears.
The story follows Miguel Rivera, a young Mexican boy who dreams of becoming an accomplished musician like his idol Ernesto de la Cruz. The only problem is that his family has a generations-old ban on music. Desperate to prove his talent, Miguel finds himself in the stunning and colorful Land of the Dead.
The story is great, it’s emotional and it centers on the theme of family. Even though it’s set in a rural village in Mexico, it has a timeless and universal feel to it, which is why on its opening week, it already outperformed its other box office contenders.
For those who’ve heard that this film is a lot like Fox’s 2014 film The Book of Life, it’s not. The comparison begins and ends with the theme of the Day of the Dead. It’s a separate story entirely.
That being said, there are some issues with cliches and tropes that you may pick up on in Coco that kind of spoil the ending, but the movie does an amazing job of playing with them, subverting them and making you forget that they even existed.
Coco’s animation is of the usual high quality that people have come to expect from Pixar. It’s bright, it’s colorful, and they do some unique things with the skeletal characters in the movie. The Land of the Dead is wonderfully done, to the point that it feels like an actual place people live in. The voice cast is talented, going so far as to dub the Spanish version of the film. It’s those extra little details that add to the authenticity of the film.
The only real complaint about the movie wasn’t about the movie, but the Frozen “short” at the beginning of the movie that pushed the beginning back 30- 40 minutes. The film was directed by Lee Unkrich, and if that name doesn’t sound familiar you may know him as co-director of Toy Story 2, Monsters Inc. and Finding Nemo. He is also the director of Toy Story 3, so with a track record like that be prepared to have your emotions messed with.