St Pat’s Movie Night enters a new realm next Wednesday for the season’s upcoming festivals. Día de los Muertos (Day of the Dead) — a holiday that celebrates those who have passed — comes alive in the movie "The Book of Life” (2014).
It is director and animator Jorge Gutiérrez's first feature film, and he says it's his own take on what happens after death. Set in the 1920s in Mexico, the animated movie centers on the fiery and brave Maria Posada (voiced by Zoe Saldana), and her two suitors: the handsome town hero Joaquin (Channing Tatum) and the soft-spoken Manolo (Diego Luna), who comes from a long line of bullfighters. And, as one might expect in a film about Día de los Muertos, some of the characters are transported to the afterlife. At first, it looks like a lively Mexican fiesta, filled with music and bright, colorful papel picado — cut-out paper decorations. "If you do something memorable, and you live a life that others admire and others look up to you, and you pass away, you get to go to the land of the remembered, this beautiful land that is all about memories," says Gutiérrez, who was born in Mexico City. Ruled by a sensuous "La Muerte" (voiced by Kate del Castillo), this land has "epic fiestas, and all you-can-eat churros.” But if you were a bad person, Gutiérrez says, you go to the land of the forgotten: "It's the void of life, the void of color, the void of anything.”