Guardian - 21 January 2018, 10:00 (+ 2297 days 8 hours and 43 minutes) Movies & TV
An aspiring musician looks for his ancestor in the Land of the Dead in a Pixar film that makes light work of complex ideasWith its catchy, singalong soundtrack and feelgood family-values message, Pixar’s latest project is a glittering return to non-franchise form after 2015’s lacklustre The Good Dinosaur. Twelve-year-old Miguel (Anthony Gonzalez) wants to be a musician, so it’s pity that in his family of enterprising shoemakers, music is banned. Family folklore has it that his great great-great-grandmother, Mamá Imelda, had her heart smashed to smithereens by a selfish guitarist who abandoned his family to pursue music and so not a semiquaver is to be played or listened to in the house.It wouldn’t be a Pixar film, though, if our pre-teen protagonist weren’t also a rule-breaking scamp, so against the strictest orders of his guitar-smashing granny (Renee Victor), he sets about entering the town’s annual Día de Muertos (Day of the Dead) talent show. Hypothesising that deceased pop star Ernesto de la Cruz (Benjamin Bratt) might in fact be related to him, Miguel sneaks into his tomb, borrows his guitar and finds himself transported to the Land of the Dead. With the help of a skinny, lolloping dog named Dante and a ragtag vagabond voiced by Gael García Bernal, Miguel must find his family (or, at least, the skeleton versions of them) and secure their blessing to return home. Continue reading...