Fear the cats and rats
The Tale of Despereaux is an interesting tale. You’ve got a very brave mouse who doesn’t know the word ‘fear’ and looks to become something greater than his fellow mice have become. He is suppose to cringe at rats, traps and cats. Instead he thinks they’re ‘neat’ and ‘interesting’. The mouse colony, which looks at him as a liability, wants him gone, so they send him off. Seaking adventure, Despereaux finds it with a princess who is need of help, a rat that needs help getting out of his society and a kingdom that needs some major saving.
The good points…
Matthew Broderick plays our lead mouse and is still the best, kindest voice this side of the mouse trap. He sounds innocent, he looks innocent and chlidren will warm up to this character in a heartbeat. Broderick’s supporting cast is equally compelling, as you have Dustin Hoffman playing the vegetarian (in a sense) rat named Roscuro, who wants to do good, but can’t figure out how amongst the bad rat lifestyle. You also have the young Emma Watson, who does a very good job at playing a princess in distress (she is no longer the whiny kid from Harry Potter). All the players know their role pretty darn well. So, on this portion of the film, it’s all good.
As for the story, it’s also on the ‘good’ side. You have all these individuals with their own problems, who look upon what most believe to be the weakest animal for help. They depend on Despereaux in some way and when he comes through it’s just dramatically powerful. This little mouse, who should be scared and unable makes everything possible to turn the lives of these individuals around. If kids ever need a boost of self-confidence, this is the way to get it. It’s a solid story led by solid characters. You could even call it a character driven movie.
Now for the bad…
The images in the movie, especially during the scary scenes, can be incredibly jarring to kids. The rats in particular are scary for adults. When the idea that Roscuro needs to eat Despereaux comes up, my kids had an alarming/stressful look on their faces. Even moreso when they had the arena with the giant killer cat. Again, very disturbing. Now, it’s not Watership Down kind of terror, but you have been forewarned as the images certainly carry a heavy weight of jarringness (is this even a word?) with them. That’s the only bad about the film.
Blu skies never looked so Blu
I have always and will always be impressed with Universal’s treatment of movies onto Blu-ray. They have been nothing short of top-notch and again it shows. The Tale of Despereaux is gorgeous. The animation in HD shines like a bright sun over a beach during the midst of the summer. It’s clear, breathtaking and hard to turn away from. With such light colors and innocent character models, you’ll be very hard-pressed to find many flaws with the visuals. Just top-notch from beginning to end. As for the audio, there is action in the film and the audio really drives it home. Thanks to a very powerful soundtrack, the audio/music will keep people involved with the movie from start to finish.
As for the features, here’s what you’re getting:
– Two Deleted Songs
– Make Your Own Soup Game
– Animating the Animals
– The Making of featurette
– Top Ten Uses for Oversized Ears
– BD-Live
– Curious George 2 sneak peek
Not quite the love a Disney classic would get, but it still will entertain the young ones in the family.
