Ernesto de la Cruz

"I have to sing! I have to play! The music, it's not just in me, it IS me!"

- Ernesto explains what he is in one of his films.

"Seize your moment/Vive tu momento."

- Ernesto's famous quote, also foreshadowing his true colors.

Ernesto de la Cruz is the main antagonist of Pixar's 19th full-length animated feature film Coco. He is Héctor Rivera's former childhood friend and music partner, Miguel's former idol and arch nemesis, the Riveras' most hated enemy and a famous singer and musician who dazzled the audience with his good looks and his charm, and was a source of Mexican pride due to his handsome looks, supposedly strong morals, and his standing up for his fellow Mexicans. He died when he was crushed by a giant bell mid-performance and resides as a soul in the Land of the Dead. However, it was revealed that Ernesto murdered Héctor and stole all of his songs and compositions to gain fame and fortune, thus making him indirectly responsible for the Riveras hating music in the first place (except for Miguel whom the latter loves music).

In the English version, he was voiced by Benjamin Bratt, who also played El Macho in Despicable Me 2, Antonio Pope in Ride Along 2, and El Topo in Snitch. In the Spanish version, he was voiced by Marco Antonio Solís (also known as "El Buki") in his first villainous role.

Beginnings
Ernesto was born in 1896. He started out as a childhood friend and business partner of Héctor Rivera, as they both entered the music industry in 1921, wooing the people of Mexico for months. However, they broke into an argument when Héctor decided to return to his wife, Imelda, and daughter, Coco, while Ernesto wanted to continue on with the business.

Though Héctor assured Ernesto that the latter can manage on his own, Ernesto desperately claims that he can't do so without Hector's songs. However, Hector remains firm in his decision to go back to his family as Ernesto was angered by this refusal. Pretending to support Héctor's decision of returning to his family by making a toast and saying that he would move "heaven and earth" for him, Ernesto secretly spiked Héctor's drink with poison, which took effect as they walked down the street towards the train station.

Watching Héctor succumb to his death by the poison, Ernesto took the opportunity to steal Héctor's guitar and songbook and pass off the songs as his own, gaining a reputation in the music industry and becoming one of Mexico's most acclaimed musicians, as well as a film star and writer. Ernesto kept his murder secret by claiming that Héctor died due to food choking and never informing Héctor's family about his death.

Ernesto's murder of Héctor caused the latter's wife Imelda to assume Héctor had abandoned the family, unaware of her husband's desire to return home and thus instigated a ban on music for the entire Rivera family, while taking a hobby of making shoes as the main family business.

Eventually, during one of Ernesto's concerts while singing Héctor's famous song "Remember Me" in 1942, he was killed in an act of karma when a backstage hand accidentally leaned on a lever that caused a church bell to drop onto him. Following his own death, Ernesto's legacy lived on, which was honored by a large statue. He also maintained his reputation as he continued to perform to the citizens of the Land of the Dead, supplied with his own mansion and a crew of security guards at his disposal.

The Day of the Dead
It began with Miguel living in the ville "Santa Cecilia" with his family, including a very old Coco who is suffering from Alzheimer's. Unlike the rest of the Riveras, Miguel loves music and, in secret, hopes to one day be as famous as Ernesto, whom he considered to be his hero and idol.

Upon learning about a talent show during the Day of the Dead, Miguel discovers from Imelda's portrait that his descendant has a guitar similar to the one that Ernesto is holding in a photo. Believing that Ernesto is his great-great grandfather, Miguel tries to explain his discovery to his family, but they refuse to believe this, with Miguel's grandmother Elena destroying Miguel's guitar to prevent him from following the path of his ancestor. Fed up with his family's views on music, Miguel angrily runs away, deciding to perform himself.

However, Miguel finds that he can't enter without an instrument and decides to take Ernesto's guitar from inside his mausoleum to use it in the concert. In the moment Miguel struck the notes, he becomes a type of ghost, being unable to be seen or heard by the living except for a street dog named Dante, who is actually a disguised spirit animal. In the cemetery, Miguel meets his deceased relatives, who are shaken that Miguel has entered into the Land of the Dead.

Land of the Dead
When Miguel is taken to the Land of the Dead, he meets Imelda, who is unable to cross to the world of the living as Miguel took her portrait from the ofrenda. They discover from an officer what can help Miguel return to the world of the living before he turns into an skeleton at sunrise.

By a relative's "blessing" with a glowing petal of Aztec marigold, Imelda agrees to let Miguel back home, but with the condition that he gives up his musical desires. Outraged with this, Miguel angrily refuses and runs away before allying with Héctor, who is currently a lonely and forgotten trickster trying to visit his family to no avail and being unaware of the true causes of his death. Forming a deal, Héctor offers to take Miguel to Ernesto in exchange of delivering Héctor's picture to his family's ofrenda in order to save him from being forgotten by the living world. During their journey to Ernesto's mansion, Héctor, Miguel and Dante are being tracked down by Imelda's spiritual guide (an alebrije called Pepita).

After participating on a contest to receive an entrance to the mansion, an argument breaks between Miguel and Héctor after the latter discovers that the former could have returned to his home all the time (as Miguel had previously lied to Héctor by claiming that Ernesto was his only family around). In response, an angry Miguel leaves Hector and dismisses Dante, determined more than ever to get to Ernesto's mansion on his own. He even accuses a pursuing Imelda of ruining his life by taking music, which brings him joy, away, an act that leaves Imelda guilt-ridden and heartbroken.

Meeting Miguel
Miguel manages to enter the mansion with the help of a band (who were the winning participants of the contest) and looks for Ernesto while Héctor followed him disguised as the famed painter Frida Kahlo.

During the celebrations inside the mansion, Miguel gets Ernesto's attention by singing one of his favorite songs that he sung on television, "The World es mi Familia", though he ends up falling into the swimming pool by accident. Ernesto dives in and saves Miguel, who explains about his discoveries of his ancestry to Ernesto. Despite being aware that he had no known living relatives, Ernesto exploited the opportunity by taking it as a sign of joy and spending a quality time with Miguel to gain more support from the guests.

After the party is over, Ernesto stated that he had to make a decision in leaving everything behind to pursue his own dreams of becoming a musician and advises Miguel to do the same if he wishes. As Miguel explains his situation to Ernesto, the latter agrees to give him his blessing to send him back.

True Colors
Just as Ernesto is about to give Miguel a petal of Aztec marigold to send him home, however, they were interrupted by an arriving Héctor, who confronts Miguel for leaving him behind and Ernesto for taking away his songs while leaving him to be forgotten by the living world. A nervous Ernesto admits to Miguel that Héctor did write the songs, but claimed that he only sang them to keep Hector's memory alive ever since his death, though Héctor is not convinced by this. Nevertheless, Héctor pleads with Ernesto to let Miguel take his photo, reminding him of the time Ernesto said that he would move 'heaven and earth' for their friendship.

Upon hearing this, Miguel points out the similarities between Hector and Ernesto's argument with one of Ernesto's films where the villain attempts to kill him with a poisoned drink (in which Ernesto, who had written the film script, had used the moment of murdering Hector as inspiration to make the script). Catching on to the similarities after watching the film, Héctor thinks back to the night of his death and finally realizes in horror that Ernesto had deliberately poisoned him in order to steal his songs and achieve the fame for himself.

Enraged by this revelation, Héctor angrily attacks Ernesto for his betrayal, but the latter calls in his security guards to take him into a large cenote pit where he can't escape. Finally being aware of Héctor's former occupation as Ernesto's partner in the music industry, Miguel wonders if all of it was true or not, though he denies this to Ernesto. However, being unwilling to trust Miguel as he knows too much, Ernesto revealed his true colors by crumbling the petal and pocketing away Héctor's photo while ordering his guards to imprison Miguel in the pit, admitting that he had to murder Héctor to seize his moment in becoming a famous musician. This made a horrified Miguel realize what a murderous fraud that Ernesto really is.

In the pit, Héctor begins to fade as his daughter Coco is starting to forget him due to her deteriorating mental state, which made Miguel realize that Héctor is really his great-great grandfather, not Ernesto. Eventually, they are rescued by Imelda and Pepita, who were guided by Dante to them. Reconciling, Miguel then explains the events to his deceased relatives and that Ernesto was responsible for Héctor not returning in the first place. With this shocking revelation, Imelda and the others agree to help Héctor and Miguel recover the stolen photo and expose Ernesto's true colors.

Final Showdown
During Ernesto's sunrise show at a stadium, Miguel and his deceased relatives sneak in (with the help of the real Frida Kahlo) to recover Héctor's photo from Ernesto before Coco forgets him. They run into Ernesto by convenience, where Imelda angrily slaps Ernesto twice for being the cause of her family's grief. He is shocked that Miguel and Héctor are related, just as the deceased Rivera relatives chase him down the stadium. Ernesto calls his security staff to detain them, forcing the relatives to fight back while Imelda accidentally ends up on stage after recovering Héctor's photo from Ernesto. Spotting Imelda on stage, Ernesto angrily orders his guards to stop her and steal back the photo.

At first, Imelda is reluctant to perform, but Miguel encourages her to sing as Héctor plays the guitar. Imelda starts singing "La Llorona" while evading the security guards, which surprises her dead relatives and woos the entire audience, much to Ernesto's anger. Deciding to handle things in person, Ernesto comes in stage singing and tries to take the photo while trying to make everything seem as part of the show, though Imelda frees herself from Ernesto by stepping on his foot and gives Miguel the photo and her blessing.

However, just as Miguel can touch the petal, Ernesto angrily grabs him, ranting out that he won't let him go back with the photo because it would ruin his legacy as a great musician. Miguel angrily refutes this by stating that Ernesto is a fraud who murdered Héctor (the real musician) and stole his songs, but Ernesto doesn't care by saying that he'll do whatever it takes to achieve fame and glory. Without hesitation, Ernesto throws Miguel over the edge, much to the horror of the Riveras. Ernesto then leaves for the stage while taunting his old friend with a sarcastic apology, telling him that the show must go on.

Defeat
Though it would've seemed that Ernesto had won, as he returns to continue his performance for the concert attendees, he is unaware that Miguel's Tia rosita and Tia Victoria secretly used a video camera to brodcast his confession and throwing Miguel over the edge. This makes the outraged audience to realize his true colors and eventually turn against him with cat calls and jeers while they condemned him for his vile actions. He tries to get the Orchestra to start playing but they refuse to do anything other than glare at him with contempt. Even the Orchestra's conductor splits his baton in two without a second thought out of disgust.

Just as the confused Ernesto is being pelted with produce by the angry audience, he witnesses Pepita has saved Miguel on the monitors, making him realize that his crimes have been exposed to the entire land of the dead. Pepita then comes forth on stage to confront a nervous Ernesto for all the grief and turmoil the Rivera family had from his actions by lifting him up before throwing him from the stadium. Ernesto then falls onto a bell tower and watches helplessly as the bell falls and crushes him once again after he smashed into it (mimicking his original death), much to the audience's delight.

After receiving the blessing and returning home, Miguel uses Héctor's guitar to help Coco remember him by singing "Remember Me". Coco also reveals that she kept Héctor's old letters detailing his song lyrics and the ripped piece of Imelda's portrait detailing Héctor's face, allowing the Rivera family to finally learn the truth about what happened to Héctor all those years ago. Realizing their wrong opinion of their ancestor, the Rivera family allowed music back into their lives and proceeded to expose Ernesto as the fraud he was by using the photo and the letters as evidence of their findings. By the following year, Héctor has replaced Ernesto as the village's new musical figure. Ernesto shrine is abandoned with the sole addition being a sign that says "FORGET YOU" ("OLVIDADO" in Spanish) that was put on Ernesto's old tomb as the villagers now consider him a disgrace for his heinous actions on the Rivera family, therefore leaving the tomb to decay in a permanent state.

Ernesto still exists in the Land of the Dead since he was already dead and he's still remembered in the Land of the Living, but his crimes would forever leave him rejected by both the living and the dead and he would be remembered as a murderer, a thief and a fraud.

Trivia

 * Despite getting crushed a second time, Ernesto is likely not permanently dead due to already being dead, as Lee Unkrich confirmed. Furthermore, although he was apparently forgotten for a year before the film's epilogue, Unkrich has also confirmed that Ernesto is still remembered for his movies and his story as the one who stole Héctor's guitar and his songs and murdered him, albeit permanently disgraced.
 * Ernesto de la Cruz is a tribute to the singer/actors of the Golden Age of Mexican Cinema like Jorge Negrete, Pedro Infante, Javier Solis and many others.
 * However, Ernesto de la Cruz is actually physically based on the beloved Mexican icon Pedro Infante (in fact, the second last name of Infante was "Cruz").
 * Ernesto de la Cruz is voiced in the Spanish version by an actual Mexican singer and actor, Marco Antonio Solís a well-known songwriter and singer, also known as "El Buki".
 * In a deleted scene, Ernesto chased down Miguel to the flower bridge after being exposed. When stepping on the pedals, Ernesto fell and dissolved through the pedals. This scene was cut out to make Ernesto's death seem less tragic.
 * When Hector was about to leave Ernesto, Ernesto immediately offered a drink that had a poison which kills Hector. However, there was no preparation of Ernesto poisoning the alcohol shown. This indicates that the alcohol had already been poisoned prior to the main story of the movie and Ernesto might've planned to ultimately kill Hector in the long run. Because Hector was about to leave Ernesto earlier than he anticipated, Ernesto had to carry out his scheme earlier than planned.
 * There are a few easy-to-miss hints that foreshadow Ernesto's true colors and that he's not the missing great-great-grandfather:
 * In the Rivera family portrait, although Imelda's husband wore an outfit similar to Ernesto's, the belt buckle had two guitars on it. Ernesto's belt buckle does not have this emblem, but rather the symbol of a bull's head. The faceless man in the photo also has a slimmer build compared to Ernesto, hinting he's not the man in the photo.
 * Frida Kahlo states Ernesto mostly hosts fancy parties instead of attending his rehearsals, hinting how little he cares about music and more about popularity.
 * Ernesto is genuinely shocked upon realizing he has a great-great-grandson. This implies Ernesto never married, adopted a child, or had an illegitimate child, which, if the latter is true, would shatter his reputation due to Mexicans having very strict thoughts about children born out of wedlock.
 * Héctor states that Ernesto wasn't very talented. This is proven when the latter states in the flashback he can't succeed without Héctor's songs. This slowly reveals he stole them.
 * During the confrontation among Ernesto, Héctor, and Miguel (moments before his true colors are shown), the room is in a dark and shadowy lighting with eerie music slowly coming in.
 * Ernesto is a dark parallel to Miguel Rivera, as they were both determined to become musicians. If Miguel hadn't learned how important his family is to him, he could have ended up like Ernesto, who didn't care about family or friendship.
 * Ernesto's downfall is shared with fellow Pixar villain Henry J. Waternoose from Monsters, Inc., as both had their true motives caught on camera and lost their respect from the public. However, Waternoose had more firm, understandable reasons for his actions, yet ultimately went mad in order to save his company and stop their energy crisis, while Ernesto murdered Héctor for selfish reasons, such as fame.
 * Should be noted when Ernesto was to give Miguel his blessing to him back to the Land of Living, The petal Ernesto was holding didn't glow, This shows that he is not Miguel's missing great great grandfather since only a family member of a Rivera could send Miguel back. So if Hector hasn't interfered when Ernesto was giving Miguel his blessing, This would make Miguel realize that Ernesto no related to the Rivera, thus possibly him realize that Ernesto stolen Hector's guitar and his songs, and likely realize that Hector is his true great great grandfather.

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Ernesto de la Cruz