If you haven’t seen Disney and Pixar’s film Ratatouille, go and do it NOW! It’s an amazing piece of animation. The story is beautiful, touching and funny, the characters are cute.
Technically it’s absolutely perfect, the animation is brilliant, the attention to every little detail is awesome, the believability is stunning, the food is delicious. In all other 3D animated films food looked like rubber or plastic, here it looks like real food.
Now, why am I so excited about this movie? Why do all the critics almost unanimously give it the highest ratings? Why does it get raving reviews everywhere?
Ratatouille is an unbelievable breakthrough!!! It’s the first 3D animated film where the production crew managed to fully implement 2D animation principles. This movie is going to have the biggest impact on the animation industry since Toy Story.
Pixar’s Toy Story was the first 3D animated feature length movie in the world. When it came out in 1995 it changed the animation industry forever. Hand-drawn 2D animation became outdated, everyone wanted to see movies made with the new technology, so Shrek by Dreamworks came out and received the first Oscar in the new nomination “Best Animated Feature” set up by the Academy to support the emerging animation boom.
Pixar, Dreamworks along with Blue Sky and other smaller studios have made dozens of movies in the recent decade. However something was gone from the animation. It lacked the warmth, the life of Disney classics like Snow White, Pinocchio, Alice in Wonderland and others. 3D movies looked more like stop motion puppet animation, which had never been as appealing as hand-drawn 2D animation.
You see, hand-drawn classical animation, developed by Disney Studios, that has been captivating audiences for decades, is governed by several principles, which breathe life into characters, but these principles could not be fully recreated in 3D. It was too difficult, too costly, too time consuming.
Pixar has always been setting industry standards, so they managed to develop their own in-house software and, teaming up with director Brad Bird, made the Incredibles in 2004, a great movie where you could see the first inklings of the return to the “old school” animation. However, only with Ratatouille have the animators, again under the guidance of by Brad Bird, managed to fully merge 2D and 3D together and brought back that warm and cozy feeling of Disney animation that we know and love. Together with the wonderful screenplay, art direction, score and many other details it makes an absolute masterpiece.
Suffice to say that according to Cartoonbrew, Victor Haboush, Disney’s art director and artist, who worked on Sleeping Beauty, Lady and the Tramp, 101 Dalmatians, said about Ratatouille that “It’s the best animated film since Pinocchio.” For your information, Pinocchio came out in 1940.
