As a Mexican-American, I grew up with hardly any representation of my culture on the big screen. So when The Book of Life was released in 2014 and when Coco followed in 2017, I was very excited to see how my culture would be represented in these films. Especially since they are both centered around a very important Mexican celebration, Dia de los Muertos.
Dia de los Muertos, for those who don’t know, is a Latin American celebration to honor those who have passed. People build altars, known as ofrendas, to showcase photos, favorite items and food of the deceased. People believe that during this time the deceased are able to return to the land of the living to visit their family and get gifts to take back to the land of the dead. Many have said that it’s a celebration that is very hard to translate onto the big screen, so I do think it is important to look at these films with a critical eye.
The Book of Life
Director Jorge R. Gutierrez and producer Guillermo del Toro created The Book of Life to fully capture the beauty of Mexican culture. In an interview, Toro explained the film by saying, “Ultimately, film is a banquet. The more dishes you have from around the world, the better the banquet is. To me, this is like eating out. When you go to a Chinese restaurant, you want it to be truly Chinese. If you go to an Italian restaurant, you want it to be really Italian. And this film is unapologetically Latin and Mexican.”
With a cast jam-packed with popular Latino actors, and Channing Tatum for some reason, this film celebrates Mexican culture beautifully. My favorite part of the movie is that it depicts both the “Land of the Remembered” and the “Land of the Forgotten,” which over the course of hundreds of years, have evolved from the original Mictlan, the afterlife in Aztec mythology. I also love how La Muerte and Xibalba, the rulers of the respective lands, have a cute relationship going on—even if it is a bit toxic.
However, as beautiful as the movie is, I don’t think it’s the best or most accurate representation of Mexican culture. For starters, the Mexico that Gutierrez decided to depict is heavily reliant on stereotypes—large mustaches, sombreros, funny accents, and bullfighting, which is more Spanish than Mexican—which takes away from the beauty of what truly is Mexico. I’m not saying that Mexico doesn’t have any of those things, but they definitely are not fully representative of Mexico and its culture.
And for a movie that is specifically based around and set on Dia de los Muertos, it isn’t celebrated much by the living people. There is no building of ofrendas, talks about loved ones that have passed on, no mention of them returning for the day, and almost no mention of the actual holiday, despite it being marketed that way. Actually, the only time something is even said is at the very beginning and at the very end of the film, and that’s about it. Manolo goes through a grand adventure in the Land of the Remembered, but there is next to nothing for the living people, which doesn’t make much sense.
I’m not going to lie, this movie is visually beautiful. The cinematography is nothing short of amazing, but I just cannot say that it is a good depiction of Dia de los Muertos when it is mentioned. I love this movie and will never turn down an opportunity to watch it—especially since it’s my brother’s favorite movie and he never shuts up about it—but if you’re looking for a film to watch specifically for the celebration, I wouldn’t put this high on the list.
Coco
Disney and Pixar first began looking into making a film about Dia de los Muertos around 2013, however, this attempt stirred up a bit of controversy. This is because while the movie was in production, Disney wanted to just simply name the film Dia de los Muertos, and with that title, they wanted to trademark the phrase. For obvious reasons, this attempt was quickly dismissed, but the backlash Disney faced made it seem like the movie—then named The Untitled Pixar Movie About Dia de los Muertos—was not going to be received well by the public. Many Latinos began to question if Disney even had the right to commercialize their culture.
So, Disney and Pixar backed down, and laid low for a couple of years before announcing Coco at the 2015 D23 Expo. I remember hearing about Coco and I was quite excited to see how the movie would turn out when it was finally released in 2017. The movie’s directors, Lee Unkrich and Adrian Molina—Molina being Mexican-American—both stated that they wanted the movie to feel authentic and true to the tradition. Molina even stated that he loved how the movie was an excuse to dig deep into his culture, especially since he had grown up in the United States.
My favorite part of Coco is that the movie is so centered around family, just like Dia de los Muertos. From the very beginning of the film when Miguel is explaining his family dynamic to the very end when Miguel and his family are joyously celebrating the holiday together. The movie is wholly about family and that is what makes it such an incredible movie to watch. I also love how throughout the movie, characters explain Dia de los Muertos, like Miguel’s mom explaining the importance of the marigolds to the younger children or Abuela explaining the importance of the ofrenda.
I really only have one major issue with how this movie depicts another key part of Dia de los Muertos, how the dead cross over to the land of the living. The way that the movie shows this is by having skeleton border officers and making the entire ordeal really similar to that of one trying to cross a border between countries. Hector, Miguel’s great-great-grandfather, is denied entry due to his photo not being put on an ofrenda, and when he tries to cross without permission he is treated like a criminal. I feel like this is an incredibly insensitive depiction, especially when making a movie about Mexican culture. I wish that they had used another way of explaining this aspect because it really is the one problem I have with the movie’s depiction of Dia de los Muertos.
If you’ve never watched Coco, I cannot recommend it enough. I love this movie so much and I cry every time I watch it. This movie is beautiful, raw, authentic, and just overall a lovely way of showcasing Dia de los Muertos to the world.
All in all, both movies, The Book of Life and Coco, are amazing films that each deserve to be celebrated in their own ways. When it comes down to which movie does a better job at depicting Dia de los Muertos, I have to give it to Coco, but that doesn’t mean that I think The Book of Life is necessarily a bad film. Both are definitely worthy of a watch, especially if you’ve never seen either before.