Ratatouille and the future of Pixar

After seeing the by the numbers Shrek the Third and the overblown Pirates 3, I was losing hope for summer movies. Fortunately my bad streak has ended with Ratatouille, from the ever dependable Pixar (who are now eight for eight in my book). However, the relatively low opening weekend box office returns (< $50 million vs. > $125 million for Shrek 3, Spiderman 3 or Pirates 3) for Ratatouille had me a bit depressed. Won't Pixar now be pressured into producing lowest common denominator movies and sequels as the only possible way that Disney can recover the gazillions they paid out?

Fortunately Pixar's reply to this question is a defiant "never", and this message is not so subtly encoded in the film's plot. The following discussion is for people who have already seen the film; however, I'll provide enough information so anyone can follow and will include mild spoilers. My thesis is that the story of Ratatouille is actually the Disney-Pixar story. Because Brad Bird and Pixar are mostly concerned with making a superb movie, they don't push the allegory too far; however, the message is there and it is defiant.

The primary action in Ratatouille takes place in Gousteau's restaurant. Gousteau was the greatest chef in Paris, and had a populist streak appearing on television to explain the tricks of his trade to the public. After Gousteau's death the restaurant was never the same, despite the good efforts of many in the kitchen. Gousteau's restaurant sounds a bit like Walt Disney Studios with Gousteau as Walt. The new chef, Skinner (Michael Eisner perhaps?), is mainly interested in extracting as much money as possible from Gousteau's name and is about to market a variety of rather cheesy sounding frozen food products (direct-to-video sequels?).

The hero of the movie, Remy the rat, is a true artist in the kitchen and he single handedly turns Gousteau's around through his innovations in the kitchen. When the staff discovers that Remy is responsible for the restaurant's new success, they quit en masse, and Remy must employ his entire rat colony in the enterprise. Although the rats create a masterpiece for the critic Anton Ego (voiced by Peter O'Toole), the restaurant is closed after the health inspector discovers rats in the kitchen. However, in the happy ending the heroes of the film open a bistro for both rats and humans, where excellent food is prepared and Anton Ego is a regular.

Incidentally, the process where seemingly hundreds of rats prepare the meal is not unlike the process of animation itself, where countless people make small but fundamental contributions to the painstaking process with the artist, Remy (Brad Bird?), in charge.

There are two major lessons which are spelled out for us by the film; the fact they are so blatantly spelled out is one of the few bits of pandering the movie makes to the younger set. The first is that pursuing ones calling as an artist must take supremacy over most other considerations - it's better to pursue excellence in a bistro than mediocrity in a fine dining establishment. To me, this moral is defiantly telling the viewer that Pixar will resist the temptation to sink to the lowest common denominator, and will create art on their own terms. The second lesson is that although not everyone can create great art, great art can come from anyone and anywhere. This lesson has nothing to do with the Pixar-Disney situation, but in part addresses the rivalry between animators (the rats) and live-action filmmakers (the human cooks). The reflexive dismissal of animation as an inferior art is attacked in this message, but the most effective attack is presented by the existence of this wonderful film.