Día de los Muertos might not be as prominent a holiday as Halloween, but the deliciously family-oriented celebration has been steadily gaining notoriety since its late 1930s inception. The Mexican holiday’s rise has been shepherded by some excellent cinema over the years, but the most prominent is without a doubt, Disney/Pixar’s Coco. The film is guaranteed to make you laugh, attempt your very own grito, and bawl your eyes out. The latter hits especially hard during that touching final moment when Mamá Coco utters that simple word before the unforgettable “Remember Me” plays one final time.
Coco, though far from the main character of the movie, is the central point of the film (if the name wasn’t a dead giveaway). She’s the lynchpin of the family connecting the long-missing Hector to his precocious great-grandson Miguel, and though she doesn’t have much to say, her only song in the movie is an absolute tear-jerker. The long overdue reconciliation between a little girl and her missing father brings the whole theme of family together and serves as the oh-so important emotional finale of the movie.
Who plays Mamá Coco?
Mamá Coco’s captivating performance comes from Mexican actress, Ana Ofelia Murguía. Born in 1933 in Mexico City, Mexico, Murguía’s first gig was in an experimental short made for the 1968 Summer Olympics hosted in her home country. While she worked consistently over the following years, her first major recognition in film came in 1994 with Queen of the Night, which landed Murguía her first Ariel Award nomination. Over her career, she has been in more than 100 films and TV shows, and though she has been nominated for the prestigious Mexican cinema award 6 times in her career, Murguía has never managed to nab the coveted award. Surprisingly, Coco is the actress’s only listed singing credit to date.