Ratatouille Review

Brad Bird took over Ratatouille in 2005 from Jan Pinkava, who had devised it, and rewrote it: he killed off the chef Gusteau, enlarged Skinner and Colette, and made the rats less human. The result is Pixar's most grown-up film. Gusteau's motto, anyone can cook, is tested rather than repeated, and the conclusion is sterner than it sounds: not everyone can become a great artist, but a great one can come from anywhere. Patton Oswalt's Remy is proud and prickly rather than cute, and Lou Romano's Linguini, steered by tugs on his hair, is a feat of physical comedy.

The craft is lavish. Paris is lit like a memory, the food was developed with help from chefs including Thomas Keller, whose layered confit byaldi becomes the climactic dish, and Michel Gagné's bursts of abstract colour show what flavour feels like. Michael Giacchino's Paris-inflected score completes it.

Peter O'Toole voices the critic Anton Ego, and his closing review, a critic reckoning with what his job costs, is the best-written speech in any Pixar film. The middle stretch leans on Skinner's schemes and a romance with Colette that the film barely needs. It won the Oscar for Best Animated Feature, and its Metacritic score of 96 is tied for the highest of any Pixar film.