Lots of talented people in on this one. Had to give it a shot.

What’s It About? A reluctant bullfighter, Manolo Sanchez, travels to the land of the dead in search of a way to protect his hometown and win the heart of the woman he loves.

STRAIGHT UP: All style, no substance. 5.5/10

What I Liked

Gorgeous visuals – A bright and diverse color palette, distinctively Mexican styling cues, and the characters’ unique wood-block styling combine to create a visual feast.

A different perspective – Diversity in all forms of media is as important now as ever. A film with a Mexican hero and a plot inspired by Mexican folklore and heritage is a welcome change of pace.

What I Disliked

Too ambitious for its own good – The Book of Life tries to stuff a dozen important characters and a half-dozen ongoing sub-plots into a 90-minute children’s movie. There isn’t enough screen time to go around, so everything just comes out feeling half-baked.

Channing Tatum as Joaquin – I like Channing Tatum a lot – he’s a goofy, funny, charming guy. This role doesn’t give him anything to do, though; the Joaquin character is just barely important to the story.

Maria – The movie tries to present Maria as a confident girl who can take care of herself, but at the end of the day, I felt like she was just a prize for Manolo or Joaquin to win. This feels less acceptable in a world where Frozen exists.

Chakal – Never have I seen a villain shoehorned so desperately and awkwardly into a children’s movie.

The soundtrack – I expected some uniquely Mexican musical arrangements, or maybe even some Spanish vocals; instead, I got weird remixes of dated pop songs with some Spanish guitar thrown in here and there.

The frame story – The events of the movie are framed as a story being told to a group of kids by a tour guide at a museum. This device is used to wring cheap laughs out of the audience (by having one of the brats interrupt the story with an exaggerated reaction) and to add one more trite moral at the end. How tiresome.

CLOSING THOUGHT: The Book of Life gives the impression of a movie that has no confidence in itself. Like a nervous comedian testing a new routine, it seems to doubt its own material, and changes its focus every few minutes in a desperate attempt to keep everyone’s attention. Then, to make matters worse, it occasionally trots out the kids in the frame story to not-so-subtly remind the audience of how fun and exciting everything is supposed to be. Not only does this ruin any narrative and tonal consistency, it also robs the work of something more intangible – its charm. It feels like there aren’t any signature moments in this film, mainly because there’s nothing to build into one. I couldn’t lose myself in the world of this film because I only ever saw it in passing. I was genuinely excited about The Book of Life going in – it’s seasonally appropriate and the credits list the names of some of my favorite people in the business (Tatum, Zoe Saldana, Guillermo del Toro) – but so much of that potential was wasted. The sheer visual appeal of the movie may be too much for some to resist, but in general, I don’t recommend this one.