Way overpraised ...

Rating: 2/10 (3 August 2007)

What is it with the excessive overpraise for movies under the Pixar banner? I'll admit the company reinvigorated interest in animated movies a decade ago with photo-realistic visuals, clever characters, witty scenarios, and decent stories. Little of that was evident in RATATOUILLE. This movie was stale, uninspired, overlong and lacking in creativity.
Everyone knows the premise by now: a rat works undercover as a chef in a fancy restaurant to prove that "anyone" can be a great chef if they want to. We know this theme because it is repeated ad nauseum to stretch out a movie that has nothing else to offer. That is not the only idea that is repeated over and over again. Cooking scenes, the rat being hunted and chased by the head chef, the love/hate dynamics between the two "human" leads, all make you wonder when we'll see anything new before the movie ends. We don't; the story just limps to its foregone conclusion.
About the animation: Done in CGI hyper-realism, it elicits a "wow, that bubbling pot looks just like a photo" admiration that lasts about 5 minutes. By contrast, the end credits are accompanied by '60's-style Disney animation, and it is much more interesting. Maybe it's time for Pixar to turn the clock back.