A REVIEW OF COCO BY CARLI M.

Hey kids! I’m Carli, and I’ve got issues.

One of them? I prefer movies to people.

So, I figured a good idea for a column for a newspaper? A movie review section!

For the first movie, I thought I’d do a movie that’s very much in the spotlight right now, what with it’s two Oscar awards: Coco.

I’ll admit, when I saw Coco in theaters a week after it came out, I was extremely angry that I had to sit through a twenty-minute Frozen “short” where Olaf insulted a lot of cultures and sang terrible songs, and Idina Menzel was treated like plot putty. Not cool, Disney!

WARNING!! This article contains spoilers, so if you haven’t watched the movie, don’t read this.~Ya been warned~

First of all, this film is visually stunning. When I saw La La Land, in all of it’s Oscar-winning cinematography, I was like, “Wow! Nothing can top this level of gorgeousness!”

I stand corrected.

The Land of the Dead literally gave me goosebumps. And I think I was contemplating my existence when it got to that scene where De La Cruz performs ‘Remember Me’ (and dies-stupid giant bells that clearly weren’t supported correctly) and the re-creation of that at the Oscars was like, ‘Ahh! That’s awesome!’

Pixar impresses me time and time again with their movies, not just because they’re all smart, funny, and visually pleasing, but because they’re the kind of movies that are hard to look away from.

They’re also usually shoo-ins for various Oscars, Golden Globes, and SAG Awards.

Coco was no different. The background music is appealing, the dialogue flows, the easter eggs are popped in in the most subtle and Pixar-ish ways, and the plot is inspired.

I think one of the most interesting things about Pixar is that it can be like,

“Heeeey, so I was in Mexico last week, and can we make a kids’ movie about Day of the Dead?”

And John Lasseter is like “You. I like you. Let’s talk.”

Two years later, you’ve got a movie starring a young boy who incidentally shows up in the Land of the Dead.

On the animation.

The Land of the Dead is stunning.

It’s one of those movies that if you do decide to see it in a movie theater, you won’t regret it. The big screen adds the effect of feeling like you’re actually there, as an extra, a bystander, or maybe a character in the movie itself.

Besides the Land of the Dead, the details in this film are phenomenal. The way that Mama Coco is animated is such a step up from even Up, where we last saw elderly people up close. The minor things: the peach fuzz on Miguel’s cheek, the wrinkles on Coco’s face, and the wear and tear on the work benches, there from decades of shoe-making.

On the plot

Past the gorgeous animation, the plot has a couple of holes, nearly all of which are resolved by the end of the film. Miguel is a promising main character, determined and ambitious: and you can tell this from how he teaches himself to play the guitar and by fixing up the acoustic, etc., etc. He’s also loyal and kind, despite disobeying his family and chasing a musical career path against his Abuelita and Mama Imelda’s wishes.

The ending was a very interesting twist, seeing as I was expecting a ‘follow your dreams’ or ‘keep on keeping on’ lesson typical of Disney. Instead, Imelda constantly tries to stress to Miguel that some things are more important than others. The final touch, the cherry on top, is that it’s all about sacrifice, and trying to reconnect family members (I.e., Miguel singing to Coco so that her final memory of Hector will resurface and his memory will not die out.)

I had a lot of expectations when I went to see Coco, and it certainly did not disappoint. Full of twists and turns, lovable spirit animals (Alebrijes) and even a little taste of a murder plot (Not gonna lie, that’s a little dark, Disney.)

Though it is, of course, full of your typical slapstick-and-potty-humor that is so popular with the eight-year-olds of America these days, Coco is still funny with the Pixar twist it’s been harboring since 1995. Hector cracks a couple of jokes that I think we all can relate to. Miguel’s dog, Dante, is comical on his own, and it could, technically, be classified as a humor film.

On thoughts of a sequel

It isn’t the type of movie that necessarily calls for a sequel. I mean, I’m even a little iffy at Pixar because it’s currently working on Toy Story Four. (Don’t get me wrong, I’m sure it’ll be great! And Annie Potts. Always a win.) It’ll probably go into the ‘fans think they want a sequel, but they really don’t’ pile, along with Up, Brave, A Bug’s Life, Wall-E, Inside Out (which, quite honestly, I think could be great for a sequel), Ratatouille, and The Good Dinosaur. That isn’t to say that none of those films will have sequels. For example, Finding Dory took thirteen years to come out after the original Finding Nemo hit theaters in 2003. Toy Story 3 came out in 2010, eleven years after Toy Story 2 appeared in 1999. And Incredibles 2, whose successor was released in 2004, is set for sometime in late 2018- to paraphrase Syndrome, fifteen years too late. Coco, however, could be one of those films that doesn’t necessarily set itself up for a sequel, yet they bring one in anyway, ten or so years from now. I don’t think I’d mind, as long as it does justice to the original, and they don’t destroy it with an unnecessary espionage plotline (Cars 2, I’m looking right at you, you little disgrace).

I’m hoping to do an entire article focusing on the anatomy of Pixar and it’s countless sequels, but I may have to wait until Wreck-It-Ralph 2 comes out, seeing as it’ll be the first non-Pixar Disney movie to hit theaters. (Frozen 2 will be next, if you’re wondering.)

On ‘Remember Me’

‘Remember Me’ is a great song. Sweet, short, and sob-inducing. I like it, (even though ‘This is Me’ from the Greatest Showman was Oscar-robbed, in my opinion) and I certainly think while it may not be the iconic-ness achieved by ‘You’ve got a Friend in Me’, I think it was sweet enough that it certainly deserved an Academy Award.

On it’s critical reception

Coco was a unanimous hit, receiving an approval rating of 97% on Rotten Tomatoes, and given an average rating of 8.2/10 stars. Critics called it “A masterpiece,” “The best film of the year,” and “An animated delight that will be cherished for years to come.”

All in all…

While I certainly do not think that Coco is the best movie I’ve ever seen, nor is it the best Pixar film, it’s certainly up there along with Inside Out and Up: a great story, with lots of talent and plenty of humor to go around, bending the laws of physics realistically (if such a thing should be possible) and dancing around the stupidity that animated movies often delve into. Going back on my previous statement, there are indeed slapstick jokes and potty humor- as every movie has- but I noticed a refreshing lack of fart jokes. Coco is a story that can, has, and will be enjoyed by the whole family for years to come.

Find @Car2749 on the Forest Trail Academy website to vote on what movie I should review next:

http://community.foresttrailacademy.com/modules/?r=poll/&action=show_poll_info&id=186

by Zaimairie V.

In this fast-paced world, it doesn’t take long for a snapshot to be trampled by the busy minds of quick-stepped pedestrians in a sidewalk: their eyes always looking forwards and oftentimes decorated by a crease in their brow. Ignoring the unstoppable continuity of time and the human urge to follow its pace, part of my craft as a photographer has always been to capture the most special moments in human life. Thus, the day I started looking at life the same way I looked at it through my lens, I was able to break from the confinements of the fast-paced world we currently live in. In the same way, I was also able to recognize the importance of photography in our perception of the world around us.

Despite not being its original intention, photography in general has become a crucial part in maintaining and nurturing our empathetic human nature. Aside from its informative purposes, its capacity to evoke human emotion and to conserve our most significant memories has managed to break the glass wall formed by the fast-paced rhythm of our society. By doing so, photography has provided us with a useful tool in the task of freezing time and taking a minute to appreciate the most special details of human life.

Carli M. is a seventh grade DJ-in-training who hopes to someday grace the likes of Broadway. In the meantime, however, she creates playlists for her peers to listen to in the hope that it gets them through a tough workout, a boring chore, or maybe just a typical Monday. She enjoys playing video games, writing and reading, and putting together biographical blurbs about herself in the third person.

Calpurnia- City Boy

Allie X- Paper Love

Lights- Fight Club

Alice Merton- No Roots

The 1975- Chocolate

King Blu- Hip Hop

Panic! At The Disco- Vegas Lights

Hiatus Kaiyote- Molasses

Sleeping at last- Saturn

Gorillaz- Clint Eastwood

Andra Day-Cheers to the Fall

Phillipa Soo-Times are hard for dreamers (pop version)

The Beatles- Eleanor Rigby

Nothing But Thieves- Sorry

Halsey- Alone

Forest Trail Academy's Chef's Table Club (formerly the "Cooking Club") is excited to share their most recent cooking project: breakfast recipes!