The Rat Review

I got around to seeing Ratatouille tonight, and I credit my French-Canadian roots for being able to spell the title correctly. While it’s kind of ironic that I’m doing a review on a movie that revolves around food and food criticism, I’ll do it anyway.

Pixar seems to be on a streak for the past decade; they really did another great job on this film.

Ratatouille is the story of a rat named Remy, who aspires to be a chef. You can tell as much from the movie poster, obviously, but what makes the story really inspiring is Remy seems devoid of the stereotypical snootyness that surrounds professional culinary experts; he genuinely enjoys cooking in order to be creative. After some mishaps involving an old lady with a shotgun, Remy and his family of rats are forced out of their home and are separated in the sewers of Paris. All alone, Remy then makes his way to a three (formerly five) star restaurant named Gasteau’s. Gasteau, presented through the movie as an overweight, jolly man, was a chef whose motto was “Anyone can Cook”. This is a theme for pretty much the entire movie, as Remy becomes acquainted with Linguine, the dishwasher of the establishment.

After helping Linguine out of a few scrapes involving his horrible cooking, Remy teams up with the young Frenchman to become an amazing culinary hurricane. Remy resides in Linguine’s hat, manipulating him through pulling his hair; although this puppetry seems a little bit unrealistic, it is a cartoon, and we’ve seen worse.

Gasteau‘s was formerly a five star establishment until it was given one bad review by the positively creepy critic known as Ego. Gasteau’s death by grief later dropped it another star on the roster, as which is apparently the custom (they actually state this in the movie. Crazy country!). The restaurant is now staffed by an ecclectic group of chefs, ranging from French beauty Colette to Horst, a crazy-ass convict (“I killed a man. With THIS THUMB”). Remy and Linguine seem to fit in quite nice there; the human cast is just that: human. They’re believable and full of personality. The same can be said of the rodent population as well. They’re funny, full of life, and again, most importantly, believable.

The soundtrack to this film is just amazing. It gives it a feel of really being in Paris; very authentic. It looks beautiful; the animators really outdid themselves this time. It’s funny enough to captivate kids, yet mature enough to entertain the adults that might be watching with them. I really recommend it to anyone; it’s simply an amazing film.

Bon appetit.