The playful rivalry of Manolo and Joaquin for Maria is egged on by Xibalba and La Muerte in somewhat schematic though visually inventive ways. Their object of desire, Maria (Zoe Saldana), the Mayor’s daughter, is a firecracker of a beauty, well educated and independent she’s the one who teaches Manolo the wrongness of mistreating animals when she frees some adorable pigs early on in the film, wreaking havoc in her father’s town. Joaquin (voiced by a very game Channing Tatum) is the son of a late military hero and has been pegged for glory as the one to save San Angel from the fierce bandit Chacal. Manolo (voiced as an adult by Diego Luna) comes from a legendary bullfighting family and is himself a talented matador, save for the fact that he hates the idea of killing bulls he wants to play the guitar instead. The film then follows the three kids as they grow up in the touristically quaint town of San Angel, which is right in the middle of Mexico (which itself is, of course, “the center of the universe,” as the film reminds us). Winner gets to rule the Land of the Remembered. They find three best friends - two young boys and a girl - and each stakes their kingdom on which boy will marry the girl. (There’s also a godlike entity called the Candlestick Maker, voiced by a rather unexpectedly joyful Ice Cube.) Less a devil and more a lovesick trickster, Xibalba makes a bet with his beloved Muerte.

Beyond (or beneath) that, however, lies the Land of the Forgotten, a joyless place where a whisper can turn you into dust this is where you go if nobody in the Land of the Living remembers you, and it’s all presided over by the creepy Xibalba (Ron Perlman), a green, glowing, grinning beast covered in candles and chains. Beyond our own world, there is the Land of the Remembered, where our beloved forebears go when they die, and where they live in festive, communal immortality, presided over by La Muerte (voiced by Kate del Castillo). It’s a potentially grisly setup, but the actual movie makes death look downright fun.īefore settling on a fairly conventional love triangle, the film gives some context to the Day of the Dead. Gutierrez’s animated film is a family-friendly story that celebrates Mexico and Mexican culture, in particular, el Dia de los Muertos (the Day of the Dead), the holiday reserved for communing with one’s ancestors who have passed from this world. The film is just macabre enough to feel of a piece with del Toro’s other films, which often fuse a child’s-eye view of the world with the grim and the uncanny. It’s an understandable association, though. Producer Guillermo del Toro’s name is all over The Book of Life, even though it was conceived, co-written, and directed by animator Jorge Gutierrez.

The book of life movie