Pixar Redeems Itself with Ratatouille

Rating: 8/10 (13 June 2007)

Ratatouille reviewed by Samuel Osborn
Last year, when penning out the review for Pixar's last film, Cars, I wrote, "Let's decide that this can be Pixar's single use of the Get Out of Jail Free card. Now they're back to square one." I finished with a suggestion for "Pixar to go sit in the corner where it can hide beneath its dunce cap." Well Pixar can come out now, because it has redeemed itself with Ratatouille.
Pixar's return path to the throne is led by the likes of a sewer rat named Remy (Patton Oswalt). Remy has a taste for the finer things in life, shunning the scavenged garbage horded by his father and the rat colony. He steals away to the kitchen and the French chef, Gusteau's, cookbook, "Anyone Can Cook", whenever possible, sleuthing gourmet cooking in secret. This, however, leads to the rightful owner of the borrowed kitchen discovering Remy red-handed with the cooking utensils. Havoc is wreaked and suddenly a rifle appears, ousting Remy and his rat colony from their country living for good. But in the chaos of evacuation, Remy is separated from his family and marooned off to the city of Paris, popping out of the sewer to arrive at the very restaurant of his most admired chef, Gusteau.
Here the tales of Remy the rat and Linguini the garbage boy (Lou Romano) intertwine. On Linguini's first day at Gusteau's, he collides with the soup pot, sloshing half of it to the ground. Before any of the chefs notice, he starts refilling the pot with any and every ingredient within reach. Admiring the kitchen from his minute, mouse-sized hiding place, Remy witnesses Linguni's frankensoup. He maneuvers to the scene by means of acrobatic rodent scurrying and puts his culinary instincts to work. It isn't long before Linguini notices, watching as Remy dices at vegetables and tears at the herbs, sprinkling them with zeal into the now delicious soup. An idea is hatched between the two after the night is through. If Remy could somehow cook for Linguini in secret, then Remy could play out his dream of becoming a gourmet chef and Linguini could hold his job.
Of course, as when Mr. Incredible attempted to relive the superhero glory days in secret, hiding a sewer rat in the confines of a gourmet kitchen is no easy task. Though Mr. Incredible was dealing with much more weighty circumstances for an animated film, which is the limb found lacking in Ratatouille. The Incredibles, the animated benchmark in mastery and Writer/Director Brad Bird's first attempt with Pixar, handled more solemn themes than the chasing of one's dreams. Its characters juggled middle-aged crises and marital boredom. They felt trapped by a beaming postcard family. Such themes appeared in Little Children, where adultery and sexual catharsis reigned king. But Mr. Bird managed to channel such discontent into a whirling, comic book world of superheroes. The colors, adorable animation, and Oscar-winning sound jostled the little audiences into soaring contentment, while the adults were offered an honest, smart story to sink into. Ratatouille isn't lacking in either of these categories, as the animation is as adorable as ever, the sound as bombastically rousing as before, and the story clever and humble. But it's the maturity of its themes that's absent. This isn't a middle-aged crisis; this is a rat playing puppeteer to a freckled teenage chef.
But disappointment over Ratatouille not surpassing the likes of the best in animated film-making is hardly a criticism at all. It very nearly is a compliment. Mr. Bird has proved that he has a supreme knack for finding the animated in the droll. Ratatouille could very easily be filmed using live-action counterparts. Think Garfield in the kitchenick. But by dreaming up the entire affair through the computed neurons of CGI animation, a liveliness is achieved that would otherwise be ignored. Mr. Bird has made rats adorable and French cuisine not annoyingly pretentious. Such feats are magnanimous. And along the way he managed to tell a warm tale of friendship, romance (not between the rat and the boy, mind you), and the joy of cooking.
-Samuel Osborn