beautiful animation and a few cute moments, but . . .

Rating: 2/10 (8 July 2007)

Two stars for two reasons to see Ratatouille
1. The animation is really beautiful, particularly the scenes of Paris.
2. The film had a few cute moments (Remy in a jar, the breakfast, the 3 knives in the sleeve, etc.).
Reasons why I was terribly disappointed:
1. Pixar decided to do both cute fantasy rats and to show off their incredible skills by doing "real" rats. A cute cartoon rat is enchanting, but the realistic rats swarming, raiding garbage, ravaging farm crops, nesting in attics, burrowing in food, slinking through sewers were DISGUSTING! Ewwwwww!
2.The movie was waaaay too long. I was not swept up in the film, was very conscious of the time, and could not wait for the film to end. The kiddies in the audience squirmed throughout. The mother in front of me, when she wasn't dealing with her bored kids, spent the whole film text messaging. The film should have been more tightly edited, which leads me to . . .
3. The plot was ridiculous and all over the place: Remy's conflict with his fellow rats, the chef ghost, the critic, the lawyer, Linguini, the evil head chef, the granny, the health inspector, yikes! I particularly hated the granny who destroyed her home with a shotgun, the ENDLESS chases, and every time Remy's family appeared on screen. I could probably list some additional tedious scenes, but the movie was NOT memorable in any way, except for the "yuck" factor.
4. Completely missed the point of "Anyone can cook." Linguini could not cook; he seemed to be a nitwit buffoon throughout.
5. Why not just have Moses appear and say "Thou shalt not steal" instead of the pointless ghost chef?
6. I only liked Remy when he was silent. I HATED his voice!!! Every time he opened his mouth to narrate or to engage in dialogue, he completely lost me.
7. I love to look for the deeper meaning in films, love the use of metaphor and symbolism, but as hard as I tried, and no matter how breathtaking the animation, I could not get past the idea of swarms of rats in restaurants. (I remember some time ago when a bakery in my city went out of business after someone claimed to find a rat in a loaf of bread.)
Extremely disappointing, especially as I had really looked forward to this film and had entered the theatre prepared to be enchanted. I wish I had waited for some user comments before I wasted my money and time. It is a shame that the beautiful and brilliant animation was wasted on this story line.
If you are an animation geek and you have no problems with seeing rats swarming, then by all means go and see this film. I do have to hand it to animators who cam make my skin crawl with these rats. But do not be carried away by the rave reviews. This film has a lot of weaknesses.
BTW, this film is definitely being ranked way too high on the "Greatest" list. There are many truly great animated films out there, but "Ratatouille" is definitely not one of them, unless rated on technical wizardry alone.