An Animated Masterpiece

Rating: 10/10 (21 December 2008)

Just recently I sat down in my bedroom and watched the Ratatouille DVD on my surround sound system. It was my third time watching the film, and for some reason it may have been the most enjoyable. Well the first time viewing it was at a drive in movie theater, which is not really the best way to enjoy a film, but still I don't think that has anything to do with my appreciating it more in later viewing. Something clicked in my in my third viewing and I said to myself, "Man, this isn't just a great film, it's a Disney Classic like Beauty and the Beast and Snow White".
Ratatouille does one thing only the brilliant duo of Disney and Pixar could accomplish: not only does it make rats cute, but it makes them enduring characters in an animated film, every bit as much so as the fish in Finding Nemo and the Toys in Toy Story. Remy is a rodent with charming qualities, a great sense of smell and taste and a love of food which leads him to become a chef master. On the line of my belief that this is a classic Disney film, Remy is really the classic Disney animated character.
A similar classicalness could be said of Linguini, a somewhat geeky awkward human who befriends Remy after he takes credit, accidentally, for one of the rat's delicious dishes. Linguini needs Remy so he can repeat the recipe or he'll lose his job. The way the human and rat communicate is fascinating, and the way that they arrange how to work together in the kitchen is hilarious and dazzling. The food looks so great here that it makes one hungry while looking at it.
And along the way there great supporting characters including Rats like Remy's dopey brother Emile, and humans like Linguini's feisty mentor and love interest Collette, and his insensitive selfish boss Skinner. And there's Gusteau, Remy's imaginary friend, a deceased Chef that guides his journey, and Anton Ego a great representative of a real critic with harsh critiques. But really it's Remy and Linguini that dominate the film, and appropriately so. They have a chemistry that's strong, funny, awkward, angry and joyful; sometimes many of those things all at once.
What was true for other Pixar masterpieces is there for Ratatouille. It's a great story, full of well developed characters that are fantastic creations of art, has hilarious and wildly entertaining sequences, and great conflicts between the good and the not so good. But the main goal for the protagonists in this film is not to beat the bad guy; it's for them to produce great food. It's a simple pure idea taken to extraordinary height.
I'm doing something I have not done for many films here on IMDb. I'm changing my original rating for a movie. What once was a 9 now is a 10. I believe 20 years from now Ratatouille will be looked at as one of the finest animated achievements of this computer animated era of films. I'm not quite ready to call it a Snow White or Beauty and the Beast (my personal favorite animated movie of all time) but it comes quite close. A Disney Pixar Masterpiece.