Dinner is Served...Spectacularly

Rating: 10/10 (19 October 2007)

Brad Bird's latest creation takes place in Paris, the city that is thought by many to be the city of the worlds greatest food. However, there are some problems. Mainly, that our hero, Remy (Patton Oswalt), is a rat. A rat that is a brilliant chef with a taste for fine food, but a rat none the less. Running from a mad old granny with a shotgun, being separated from his family, being flushed down one of the biggest pipes EVER! and being followed by the ghost of the late, great Gusteau, the chef that says "Anyone can cook", are just some of the problems the poor rat has to face.
While this is a sweeping statement, a food critic named Anton Ego (voiced brilliantly by Peter O'Toole) takes it a bit too literally,making sure Gusteau's restaurant isn't as popular as it was. When Remy meets Linguini (Lou Romano), a terrible garbage boy/wannabe chef, he takes him under his wing (rat paw) and controls him through a strange method of pulling his hair??? The film has an excellent screenplay, amazing animations, brilliant art and mostly superb voices. The rats, normally horrible and dirty, are cute and clean. Brad Bird's screenplay is rich with jokes (Remy waves to a cyclist, who, disgusted, isn't looking where he's going and crashes into a car in a cloud of shopping and bike parts), passion (Linguini's love, Colette) and tiny details which would amaze even the greatest director (Remy's oven-glove bed, the rat poison/exterminator shop, Gusteau's ghost telling Remy what to do). It's all there, you've just got to look for it.
There is only one bad thing about 'Ratatouille'. The character and voice of Languini, is in my opinion, not as fantastic as the rest of the film. Lou Romano doesn't quite seem to hit the right note, one brick short of a house or whatever you want to say. Linguini's character is too whiny, even for someone in his position. If he whines about the cooking, and at some points Remy, ditch the rat and go get a different job. He just doesn't seem to have his heart in it to me.
Peter O'Toole, Ian Holm, Patton Oswalt and all the others, however, make it a very grand dish indeed. Patton Oswalt relies mainly on ear twitching and eyebrow raising, but when he does talk, you listen. Ian Holm, the small, evil chef who need a stool to taste soup, is, as ever, brilliant and Peter O'Toole seems to relish being the bad guy, just as Anton Ego loves to criticise the lack of relish (forgive the pun, had to be done...and the rhyme!). Dark, mysterious and even scary, Peter O'Toole brings an edge to another great Pixar villain.
All in all, the film is a masterpiece, definitely Pixar's and Brad Bird's best dish yet, but hopefully there is more to come. Consider it a starter, an "amuse de bouche", and just wait for Pixar's next dish, whatever it is, and hope it's just as delicious . In the words of Anton Ego, "Surprise me!". Parents, just hope your kid's don't want a rat