#i made her watch pretty much every movie Gael Garcia Bernal had ever made

[someinstant]

Suddenly overcome with deep nostalgia and longing for video rental places. Not Blockbusters or anything-- my favorite was an independent joint in the town where I went to college. Vision Video. It was in a building that had formerly been a laundromat and a dry cleaners, so there were multiple rooms with mismatched tile, and they almost assuredly didn't have whatever the big teen movie was-- but if you were into, like, South Korean horror or the entire back catalog of Nic Cage or German expressionist silent films or Ernest Goes to Camp or carefully labeled erotica (porn. it was just porn, but this was the American South many decades ago)-- if you were the sort of person who fell hard for a particular genre or director or actor, it was heaven.

Just wandering the store at eleven at night on a Thursday with your roommate, stacks of movies in your arms, Of Montreal's latest EP coming over the speakers, the big weird quiet guy at the counter watching a very violent anime on the TV, occasionally suggesting you watch a Danish action flick, and handing you a flyer for the local student film festival when you checked out an hour or two later.

And then you'd go home to your crappy off-campus apartment after stopping at a convenience store for snacks, flop down on the futon, and start marathoning whatever your current obsession was (my roomie: anything Edward Norton had ever done. me: basically all of Mexican Nuevo Cine), and wake up when the afternoon sun slapped you in the face, the DVD menu in playing in an endless loop in the background.

[qveenpoppy]

y'all… i just finished watching coco and oh my god, it was so good! honestly, the best film pixar’s released since the incredibles. it was just that good. (yes, inside out came out since and that was great too, but i just loved coco that much, okay?)

while the music may not be as show-stopping or get stuck in your head like, say, the greatest showman, it was still fantastic. i LOVE latin music. it just puts a smile on my face every time i listen to it, even if i can’t always understand what’s being said. nine years of public school spanish classes help a little, but not that much.

though, speaking of which, i can say i adored each and every instance where a character spoke spanish, even if was just a word or phrase here and there. it just made the film and characters feel more authentic. i mean, if this were really set in mexico, they probably wouldn’t speak any english, but hey, it’s an american movie, so i can’t complain. but another reason i liked it so much is bc i was able to pick up on what they were saying just about any time they switched into spanish, aside from that one song at the end that imelda (and ernesto, that dick) sang together.

oh, and the villain reveal. oh boy, did i not see that coming! it was way more shocking and unexpected than the infamous frozen villain reveal. i mean, maybe you could have predicted some sort of connection between miguel and hector beyond that of him being coco’s father, but ernesto murdering hector? holy fucking shit. i did not expect that outcome. and i was starting to like ernesto too! the first version of “remember me” was the only song from this film i allowed myself to listen to before seeing the movie, and i caught an interview with voice actor benjamin bratt a little while back (though i did also watch one with gael garcia bernal a week or so ago; i watch live with kelly and ryan in the mornings :) ), and i thought the bonding scenes between ernesto and miguel were cute. but of course, we were betrayed.

my actual response to the reveal about hector’s death:

that aside, i just loved the film as a whole. it was sweet, and i love the emphasis on family. true, a lot of pixar films have that same idea, but dia de los muertos is a holiday all about honoring one’s family, so this felt like it had even more of a focus on familial relationships, and i adored every bit of it.

i also love the fact that coco is miguel’s great grandmother, and the whole film is named for her. while her character didn’t have that much screentime, she really was the heart of the story, and kind of the hero in the end. i especially like that we all - at least, i did, anyway - went into the film not quite knowing where the title ‘coco’ came from, or how it’d relate to the plot of the film. other pixar films make it obvious, like toy story being exactly as labeled, cars is about cars, the incredibles is about mr. incredible and family, inside out is about emotions... i can go on and on. but not coco, that was harder to figure out. but i did, and i think it was quite clever on pixar’s part.

so, let’s get into some more specifics: love miguel, he’s a sweet kid. excellent singer. hector is adorably charming. not too good-looking, as he basically said himself, but his personality shines through enough that you still love him. everyone else was fine, no other big standouts. though, imelda’s singing voice? amazing! i need a sequel just so we can hear all the imelda/hector duets!

oh, and dante? adorable! not a very wise dog, but a perfect spirit guide (right, that’s what they were called?) all the same. i love that at the end, imelda’s spirit guide also crossed back over into the land of the living and became a cute little cat, who’s friends with dante! how sweet is that?

the animation is also fantastic. the sets/locations looked like real places i could visit - i know mexico is a real place, of course, but the land of the dead looks pretty cool too - not that i’d want to go there now, of course. i definitely think, at least, that disney needs to, if they haven’t already, add to their mexico part of epcot to incorporate things from coco. i remember the main mexican area being indoors and quite dark. they should at least add those pretty orange flower petals - oh, and string lights with them so they look like they glow! - to brighten up the place. and add that hector memorial from the end of the film, guitar and all. that would be nice.

last thing i’ll say, bc it’s partly the reason i watched this film (aside from the interest i’ve had since last summer) - the oscars. the only animated films nominated i’ve seen are now coco and boss baby. i did like boss baby a lot, but coco should definitely win. i don’t want to jinx it by saying that, but pixar just deserves it! the film was fantastic! yes, the studio - along with disney animation - wins a lot, and dreamworks is long overdue for an oscar win - they’ve only won once, the first year the animated feature category even existed, for shrek. but hey, they’ll be back next summer with how to train your dragon 3, the last of that franchise. 2020 will finally be their turn for another win.

final rating for coco: 9/10.

(part of me wants to give it a 10/10, but my heart says no. i’ve never reallly given a film a perfect score before, even last year’s batb i gave a 9.8 bc it wasn’t quite perfect. a film would have to really be great and quite special to ever top batb. but coco? still amazing, i still love it a lot. i would watch it again and again and again.)