Pixar Playlist #19 - Coco

 Ladies and Gentlemen, whether you like it or not, the Pixar Playlist

Well, we’ve finally got to Coco. Cultural awareness is difficult. We are presented with it in our day to day lives but generally only at a surface level. You talk to people with difficult experiences to you all the time, but actually explaining those experiences is another matter. What I’m saying is I understand why this film was difficult to write.

Lee Unkrich had been working at Pixar since the beginning as an editor on Toy Story. He’s had a role in pretty much every Pixar film up to 2020’s Onward. He made a debut not as a director but as a writer with Toy Story 3, which is a firm ground. He’s been in the senior creative team for every film since (and with WALL-E and Up also) but he was the main writer of Coco, an idea he’d been developing since 2010.

But importantly, he’s not from Mexico, in fact at the time none of the creative team were. Still, this is Pixar so exhaustive research is a given. The team made trips to Mexico to absorb its art and culture. And of course, the big draw. Day of the Dead. Day of the Dead is commonly used in film as set-dressing. There is an appeal of big crowds and costumes and parades and the like. It’s a bit cliché and oftentimes annoying, but Coco wants to draw to a deeper meaning behind it all.

But cultural appropriation is a tricky subject and Disney decided to make this a public debate by attempting to trademark "Día de los Muertos" (Day of the Dead in Spanish) for merchandise. How come no-one in their marketing department could tell that’s a bad idea? I can tell that’s a bad idea. Naturally they backtracked pretty quickly and changed the title to Coco, so let's hope the rest of the film is good.

Our lead character is named Miguel. After his great, great grandfather’s love of music lead to him supposedly abandoning the family, the family cut ties with music to the most impractical of extremes. But Miguel is actually a pretty gifted musician, inspired by a famous singer named Ernesto de la Cruz whose motto is “Do whatever it takes to seize your moment” and if you don’t think that sounds a little bit ominous, you clearly haven’t been watching Disney films in the 2010s.

On the Day of the Dead, Miguel plans to sing at a talent show, and after finding out that Ernesto might well be his great great grandfather and coming to blows with his family, ends up stealing his guitar. This crime against the dead on their special day magically transports him to the realm of the dead, his dead known relatives will only allow him back if he gives up music so Coco heads out to find Ernesto and get his blessing before the sun rises and he’s dead for real.

Gotta be honest, there are people who adore this movie and I’m not one of them. I think it’s good, like really good but I can’t tell you I love the story. I’m not really a fan of families imposing a ludicrously impractical ban and their children somehow being gifted in spite of it. But it’s even more of a problem here because at the end it just kinda fizzles out. Immelda in the realm of the dead softens over the course of the film, but Abuelita, Coco’s daughter in the realm of the living has no such realisation, she just kinda changes her mind at the end.

But enough critiquing the story, I’m sure I could do more but what people compliment the most about this film is its visuals and HOLY SHIT is it gorgeous to look at. I want a poster of some of these frames. Day of the Dead as a setting already allowed from some pretty creative designs and costumes but the realm of the dead looks really impressive.

And the same goes for the animation. Animating skeletons, like they were doing for most of the movie, with CG techniques posed a challenge as there are no longer muscles doing the work. The movement felt fluid, the action scene at the end was really fun. And the design allowed for some quite fun visual gags.

When it comes to cultural depiction, I can’t speak for people they’re depicting but what I can say is that it made Day of the Dead seem culturally meaningful as well just as an excuse to dress up akin to Halloween. And it seemed to avoid negative stereotypes, at least from the perspective of this white guy. I think the trademark issue was the only red flag, and not from the movie itself.

The music is solid. Remember Me won an Oscar and that’s well deserved even if I would’ve gone for This is Me that year. The entirely ending is quite moving, from the nice creative action sequence to the heart-wrenching bit with Miguel as Coco. It did provoke tears.

Coco may not be the most original story but it’s more than made up for with amazing visuals, great animation and good songs.

#1 Inside Out

#2 The Incredibles

#3 Up

#4 Finding Nemo

#5 Finding Dory

#6 Coco

#7 Toy Story 3

#8 WALL-E

#9 Toy Story 2

#10 The Good Dinosaur

#11 Brave

#12 Toy Story

#13 Cars 3

#14 Monsters Inc

#15 Ratatouille

#16 Cars

#17 Monsters University

#18 Cars 2

#19 A Bug’s Life