Ratatouille Overload

This collection of interviews, reviews and features originally ran in the June 26 Volume section of the West Valley View. 

Food — no, cuisine — stars in scrumptious new Pixar picture

Pixar’s latest dazzler is all about food. Not hot dogs, toaster pastries and microwave burritos, but serious cuisine, entrées with long-winded French names that come in miniature portions on oversized plates with drizzled sauces — one ingredient is required to be fois gras. 

Don’t send your dinner jacket to dry cleaning yet. At the end of Ratatouille, it’s a simple recipe — a peasant food; the American translation would be cheesy macaroni from a box — that’s transformed tenfold to win our hearts and, more importantly, our stomachs. It wouldn’t be a stretch to layer this theme onto cinema itself: Pixar’s simple, story-driven pictures are not just run-of-the-mill menu items anymore, but the food equivalent of culinary art.

“It’s dangerous when we start talking themes. We don’t make films with the intention of teaching you something, or having a theme bring you a message,” the film’s producer, Brad Lewis, said. “But if you look at this and see it as a metaphor for life, or friends, or film … then that makes me happy. Obviously, you can pull anything from this that you want.”

Director Brad Bird chimed in with a food allegory: “A really good hamburger is just as fine as a filet mignon. What something is about does not define the quality of it. A comic strip like Peanuts can be as profound as any good book.”

Ratatouille, which carries Pixar’s most complex story to date, is about a rat, Remy (voiced by Patton Oswalt), who stumbles into France looking for his family. He finds Linguini (Lou Romano), a human, who is working in a famed French restaurant known for its bisque, which Linguini fouls up. Linguini, it would seem, can’t cook, but Remy can. They enlist each other — the rat invents the recipes, the human makes them — to win over a morose food critic whose office is in the shape of a coffin.

The movie is directed and co-written by Bird, the creative force behind two recent animated movies involving humans — The Iron Giant and The Incredibles. Bird has, twice in a row, featured humans at Pixar, a studio that has only animated toys, fish, monsters and bugs before him.

“People are scared off by humans because we know how humans move … it’s not a mystery to us anymore,” Bird said. “I’ve always been fascinated with animating humans because it’s difficult. In Ratatouille, these aren’t life-like humans; they’re caricatures. And it was really fun to watch them develop.”

And a footnote: “This is also my first talking critter movie.”

Indeed, the critters do talk, but in his defense, they talk only to themselves. So when a human walks in on a rat conservation he only hears tiny squeaks and chirps. The illusion that humans talk human and rats talk rat is preserved, even with the anomaly of Remy, who seems to understand dialects of rat, human and food.

In the film, Remy helps steer the rather inept Linguini in the kitchen by hiding under his toque (a French chef’s hat) and pulling on tufts of his red hair as if they were reins. This presented an animation problem: how to convincingly illustrate hair. If his hair is too stiff Linguini runs the risk of looking like a Backstreet Boy minus the frosting; too floppy and it’ll dangle loosely on his digital scalp. The answer, Lewis said, was partially answered in a previous Pixar film, Monsters Inc., which featured a giant monster covered from horns to toes in purple and blue fur that matted when wet, moved when touched and swayed when blown upon. 

“The fur on the Sully character in Monsters Inc. was a precursor to us understanding how hair and fur can be done this time out. I’m no animator, but I know it was no easy process,” Lewis said. “This film builds on the shoulders of other great Pixar films. From the fur, the hair, the water, the open flames in the kitchen … we can’t take credit for understanding these things without the films that came before us.”

Bird acknowledges the difficulties on the movie, but said they were important to telling a story.

“Water’s really hard to do on a computer. But for us, our movie wasn’t set on the ocean like Finding Nemo or Surf’s Up, which I haven’t seen yet. So water wasn’t a big concern. Even the hair played a minimal role,” he said. “For this movie we just really wanted to make the food look good.”

And food is the core element to Ratatouille, which is itself a food, a vegetable dish considered to be a simple and modest staple to a French diet. Much of the movie is spent in a kitchen drizzling sauces over plates, pinching herbs into pots, dicing vegetables and it has several memorable scenes at the edges of a spoon or fork where food meets mouth, or vice versa. The film had technical help from Thomas Keller, chef and owner of Northern California’s French Laundry, an ultra-exclusive (reservations must be made month in advance) restaurant known for its exquisite . Keller provided some inside expertise, said one of the Brads (Brad Lewis).

“One thing we had to fly by the seat of our pants on was food. This is the first time that computer animation has done first-rate food. We didn’t want it to be photo real; we wanted artistic, wonderful food that evokes appetite,” Lewis said. “If you leave hungry, then I guess it was done correctly.”

Tales from a dirty rat
Once upon a time, Patton Oswalt received a phone call. On the other line a voice relayed: “You’re the rat.” And then all was good in the comedian’s world. The end.


At least with that chapter.


Oswalt, a comedian known for his railings on Bush and religion, was asked to voice Remy, the rat and star in Ratatouille. Volume sat down with him to discuss the film, food and rats, but not necessarily in that order.


Volume: Have you ever been to Phoenix before?
Patton Oswalt: My grandma lives in Tempe, Ari., so I come here all the time, especially when I was a little kid. I really like it here because it kinda feels like you’re on a moon colony … things are so bleached and clean. And I really love the desert at night. I love how when it’s really hot everyone just locks themselves in their homes to escape the heat. Sure, Hispanics have their siestas, but everyone else does a very-Caucasian version of a siesta and they’ll crank the AC, jump in the pool and then come in and watch games shows on TV. The heat is just inescapable and I’ve always found it nice to chill out indoors.

Volume: How do you get picked for voicing a rat?
PO: I heard that Brad Bird was listening to one my comedy albums and he said, “That’s the rat.” [Bird confirmed this, saying Patton is “as funny as he thinks he is.”]

Volume: Is that weird someone thinks of you as a rat’s voice?
PO: Oh, it’s totally flattering. I’ve loved Brad Bird’s work way back to his days on The Simpsons and Iron Giant. I’ve been a Pixar fan since Luxo for crying out loud. I asked myself, “Was this a dream come true?” No! Because this was so ridiculously beyond any of my dreams that I never thought it would ever ever happen. I would have been happy with so much less than this.

Volume: How much less?
PO: If I would have had one line I would have still taken it. If all I said was “give me that pot” in the background I would be blogging about how awesome it was right now.

Volume: Have you had the dish ratatouille?
PO: It’s delicious. It’s a very basic peasant dish — it’s tomato sauce and savory vegetables all grilled and cooked. It’s great. It’s like succotash or chili or pot roast in that it’s cheap and can feed your whole family. That’s why the movie works: because the dish is so simple. Think about it, anybody could make filet mignon or black truffles taste amazing. But if you can take a ribeye or a haddock and make it amazing that’s the sign of a great chef. If you can elevate something that much, you’re good.

Volume: Are you getting any stories for your stand-up from this experience?
PO: I’ve been doing a lot of kids press because of this movie. That’s when I realized how much I use cynicism and negativity just to communicate in the world. With kids you have to be really positive. It’s almost painful. They ask, [in a child’s voice] “Did you like working with Brad Bird?” I respond: “It was really really fun” as blood drips from my ears. It’s like my head’s coming apart.


Context-free thoughts from Janeane G.
Janeane Garafalo voices a sultry French chef in Ratatouille. Talking with her about just one topic is impossible. Here are some context-free examples from our uproarious conversation:



• “It’s not horrible, like, working in a salt mine, especially since it’s elective.”
• “No one makes anyone go into entertainment.”
• “Getting up at 4:15 in the morning to be on Good Morning Utah is not the highlight of my career.”
• “Apparently the timbre and tone of my voice is what people want.”
• “I haven’t been to France so I had a CD with a French guy speaking English, but then I lost that. So then I started watching CNN International because they have an anchor who speaks in a French accent.”
• “Sometimes I would forget so I would just think of suh-ren-oh-mee for the word ‘ceremony.’”
• “Sorry, I don’t know how to turn my phone off … seriously.”
• “I have no excuses, only apologies.”
• “I will one day run with the bulls in Pamplona, except I won’t because I don’t want to run with the bulls in Pamplona.”
• “I don’t cook, but I do like watching good cooks cook.”
• “I’m fiscally prudent, I’ll give myself that.”
• “I am savvy, which is why I don’t have to do Revenge of the Nerds III.”
• “Nothing against doing Revenge of the Nerds III.”
• “I think those drapes are perfectly adequate for this room. They wouldn’t have been my first choice but then again they are pleasing to the eye and fully functional.”
• “When I met Albert Brooks I thought I was going to have a heart attack.”
• “You can’t polish a turd … especially with chamois.”
• “It’s a swimsuit, but I just use it as a bra.”
• “Patton [Oswalt] has man-boobs, but he’ll admit that freely.”

Off to a good start -- thanks, IMDb

Three posts into this Web log (I won't say that other word; it rhymes with grog) and the Internet Movie DataBase, the end-all be-all of movie Web sites, plunked Pick-Up Flix on its home page. Gracias, IMDb. Since they've posted it, though, I've already added my review of Live Free or Die Hard. So, if you were diverted here from IMDb, please scroll down to read about two kinds of movie badness. And pretty please stick around for the review of Live Free or Die Hard. And in case you want to bookmark this page, I will be doing weekly reviews of movies, daily features on other cinema in general, as well as discussing old movies I might be viewing between current releases. Thanks for checking this page out.

McClane censors himself for the kids

Live Free or Die Hard takes place during what appears to be a 24-hour period. And, hey, look! That’s CTU. The only thing missing is Keifer Sutherland shooting people in the kneecaps.

24, Fox’s runaway action series, is itself a sanitized, tech’d-out version of Die Hard, so it’s ironic that even the Die Hard franchise has come full circle. It’s ironic, and also very sad. Die Hard is the high-water mark of the action genre (Die Hard 2 is the low-water mark), but here, in its fourth entry, it’s a convoluted mess of computer parts, USB cables, brain-dead OnStar dispatchers, cell phone gadgets and John McClane, dinosaur supercop still trying to find his place in a police department that may not want him. Notice how in all four Die Hard movies we’ve never seen McClane (Bruce Willis) do any real police work — not a drug bust, felony arrest, speeding ticket or littering violation. Is he kept around in the off chance terrorists hijack an airport/office/city/computer network? They need a union for that kind of cop. They can meet at the Moose Lodge.

With Live Free and Die Hard target is a computer network. Apparently, the computer infrastructure of the entire United States government can be breached and destroyed with three keystrokes, because Thomas Gabriel (Timothy Olyphant) does it, and in a suit straight out of Esquire no less. First he hacks the transportation grid, then the heart of economy (Wall Street), and finally major utilities. He has a theory and it’s called a Fire Sale: destroy the computer network of the country and it’s like hitting the reset button on our society. Of course, Tom will also steal some money — all money, in fact.

So in drops McClane, bald as Telly Savalas using Nair shampoo, tasked with bringing a computer hacker to Washington, D.C. The hacker, played by Justin Long, programmed a small portion of the Fire Sale without knowing the whole scheme, so he reluctantly helps McClane rustle through Gabriel’s plans.

I enjoyed parts of Live Free or Die Hard, but only because the grand stunts are kind of awe inspiring, or maybe just shock-and-awe inspiring. They're ambitious, too: a series of tunnel stunts multiply into larger and larger events until cars are spilling (literally) out of the tunnel. Largely, though, I’m disappointed that a modern-day McClane is nothing but a dopey cyber-cop protecting us helpless Internet surfers from computer spammers like Thomas Gabriel, a wimpy villain compared to A-list threats like Hans or Simon Gruber. And what’s with the intelligence community of the United States? The movie suggests that a Cheeto-fingered 8-year-old diverted from the Nickelodeon homepage could hack into the FBI database or post graffiti on President Bush’s MySpace page. Really?!?

What frustrated me most, though, were all the implausible computer hacking and physical stunts. Here’s an entire movie where characters hammer at keyboards and make terrible things happen. Here, I’ll try: “k;jsdsjldfnhouhsaeof jldfnoukdno[is.” I just shut down the New York City subway system, and it took one second to type. One more: “oqwhfmshsyfnfk.” That was me deprogramming Bruce Willis films from my TiVo unit. As if fudged QWERTY rows weren’t bad enough, in flies a jet that can hover with the agility of a hummingbird. And there’s McClane driving a big rig up a corkscrewing freeway of death that goes up and up and up — was the stairway to heaven not available? The jet itself is a cool trick, but the way it interacts with McClane’s world is a little hard to swallow. Not that I doubt the talent of American military pilots, but I do doubt they can fly a billion-dollar jet underneath an elevated freeway and shoot at a big rig in the process. Not even Top Gun attempted nonsense like that.

As for the rating — it’s PG-13 — I’m peeved. John McClane is an R-rated guy. Why censor him now after three R-rated adventures? As for the violence, the body count is just as high, if not higher, than previous Die Hard pictures. The only difference now is that brains, blood and guts aren’t spilling from the gunshot wounds. My biggest gripe, though, is with his tagline: “Yippee-ki-yay … (you know the rest).” Here, it’s truncated (and castrated) by a cleverly placed gunshot. Even 24's Keifer Sutherland gets away with something like a million utterances of the word "damn," and he's on TV.

Overall, Live Free or Die Hard breaks a lot of rules — including many of its own — but it’s a spirited adventure with John McClane, but not his best, nor his most believable. If you want something with some teeth check out TV’s 24, which is Die Hard lite, or Live Free or Die Hard heavy.

All things are relative ... even badness

Best I can discern, cinema badness comes in two flavors: Cabin Boy Bad and Driven Bad. One’s simply bad for you, like a grease-bloated corn dog from the state fair made by a man with no teeth and no describable personality, but oh does that corn dog taste good. That’s Cabin Boy Bad. The other, Driven Bad, is simply bad bad bad, like eating paper clips or stuffing pine cones down your throat. The names come from, of course, two horrible pictures — Cabin Boy, a Chris Elliott nonsensical comedy about a “fancy lad,” and Driven, a Renny Harlin racing picture that makes his other work (Die Hard 2, Cliffhanger, Cutthroat Island) look as brilliant as a joint collaboration between Martin Scorsese and Alfred Hitchcock in Italy during some kind of neorealist phase … and starring Laurence Olivier.

Watching both a day apart I’ve come to realize the difference between totally craptastic cinema and cinema designed to be craptastic for our amusement: one thinks it’s good and the other knows it’s not. I’ll let you decide which is which.

Let’s begin with Cabin Boy. Take whatever you’ve heard about it and reduce its awfulness by half; that’s a better assessment of Adam Resnick’s one-and-only attempt at directing (apparently studio bosses weren’t amused enough to give him a second attempt). How a movie like this was made is mind-boggling, or as Will Farrell will attest, it’s “mind bottling.” Speaking of bottles, those little glass bottles with ships in them … you could fit Cabin Boy’s premise inside one with room to spare for a nice clipper ship. It’s not high art, art or even words that rhyme with art, like “smart” or “fart.” It’s basically a movie in which Chris Elliott sinks his career into the briny deep. His gayish, impish, childish Nathanial Mayweather is a Fancy Lad, which apparently is some kind of title awarded in certain Ivy League colleges. He graduates in no discernable time period — cars and limos exist, but everyone is in 1800s clothes and the men are wearing powdered wigs — and heads off to meet his daddy for a job that requires only foul stubbornness and rude belittling (“I’m sorry, sir, I was just pondering what drifter’s corpse you stole those shoes from”). After a rather bizarre cameo by David Letterman, the film sets upon a series of surreal sea adventures in the spirit of The Odyssey involving a man-shark, abominable snowman, talking cupcake, six-armed sea mistress and her giant husband, who works in sales at the end of the Earth but still has to wear a suit to work.

Keep in mind, this is a bad movie. I will not be making arguments to the contrary. But somehow, despite its badness, Cabin Boy has found a cult following. Suddenly its badness is its key selling point. Thank not Elliott, who prances around in his hosiery and wig looking for handouts on a fishing schooner called the Filthy Whore. Thank the crew of the Filthy Whore and the fun one-liners they’re given in a film that never takes itself very seriously. Regarding how serious it takes itself: its fancy-pants attention span and its self-hating cheapness were major faults when it was released back in 1994, but now they are badges of honor. Back to the crew, each member is represented by a character trait: Big Teddy, a wall of a man (Brion James, Leon from Blade Runner), relies on sarcasm, in fact I’m sure it’s what pumps through his ripply veins; Skunk (Brian Doyle-Murphy) is allowed to plead guilty to irony and over-explanation as the film’s one source of real information; Paps (James Gammon) is a salty goon with a deviant mouth who can rhyme in sea shanties (don’t ask what “puhlinka pachinka pastinka” means); Captain Greybar is a big softy who spends less time barking orders than he spends giggling like a school boy from the mizzenmast; and then there’s Kenny (Andy Richter) who is so deficient in the IQ department that his brainwaves are weaker than a ladle full of fish chum. These characters mingle in what can only be described as madness, but somehow they’re funny. Not legitimately funny. Rather just funny because the material is so bizarre, the acting so bad, the point so diluted that you can surrender yourself to its silly sensibilities.

This isn’t the first or last movie to be this bad. Beyond the Valley of the Dolls could fall in that category. So could the disaster-movie remake, Poseidon, which I loved despite its overt awfulness. Napoleon Dynamite was widely accepted, but it plays off the same principles.

Now consider another kind of bad movie. Consider Driven. The 2001 film was directed by Renny Harlin, a man I frequently name without hesitation as the worst director. Ever. Harlin, an apparent gear head and race car enthusiast, dishes a saga unworthy of daytime television for a sport he supposedly loves dearly. Driven is filled with race clichés so obvious and obtuse that kids with learner’s permits could see them coming from three time zones. I’m sure race cars can do some of the things in Driven, but exaggeration sets upon these cars with such force that they no longer even resemble race cars. They’re like race jets, streamlined little crop dusters with sonic engines that whine and wheeze depending on the altitude and plot. They may be fast and dangerous, but any yokel with some rudimentary skill on a John Deere could jump in one and take off to, say, the streets of Chicago and under parked semi trailers. And notice how, when the cars roar through city streets, manhole covers upturn and roll down the street as if an asteroid just passed. Also, newsstands and womens' skirt aren’t safe either. One question: if a car could pry a manhole cover off the street (and those suckers are stuck in there pretty good) then why wouldn’t it shred the street as well, which is attached just as firm? Why stop there: Why don't the buildings lining the street come crashing down from the massive force of those race cars, vehicles that would make a VW Bug look like a touring bus.

It’s funny how in races, when two cars are running full-on, pedal to the floor, and right next to each other, that one car shifts into a mystery gear that the other car apparently doesn’t have. This magical gear somehow propels the car forward to win the race. Don’t forget to notice the give in the steering wheel; you’d think the drivers were controlling a school bus with a sloppy suspension by hand motions used to turn from 12 o’clock to quarter past one. I'm no expert, but when you crank the steering wheel at 200+ mph you're day is not going to end well. By far, the worst elements of the movie — besides the acting, the directing, the computer effects, the crash sequences, the love interest, Sylvester Stallone’s granite-like oration — are the race announcers who act as the voice of God to every single image on the screen. Announcer: “Rain is threatening the drivers today in Germany at the second to last race of the season …” Camera: Cut to storm clouds brewing on German horizon. Announcer: “Jimmy Bly is just not on his A-game today.” Camera: Cut to Jimmy Bly punching his helmet in frustration, his A-game clearly escaping from behind the visor. The announcers even explain things as they’re happening, as if we’re all too inept to figure out that the action our little eyes are witnessing is actually part of the story and not some random image that just so happened to float into the theater, reel itself into the movie and project itself on the screen. Image: Jimmy Bly struggling to save a friend by lifting a race car out of a small pond where it crashed. Announcer: “There’s Jimmy Bly valiantly lifting the car trying to save his injured and imperiled teammate from a cold fate in that shallow pool of rainwater. This is just incredible footage.” I kept waiting for them to say, “This life-or-death moment is brought to you by our crash sponsor Coca-Cola. Thirsty? Reach for a Coke.” I’m so tired commentators in sports movies. There are better ways to move the action along than to rely on some omniscient announcer who acts as narrator but never supplies the narrative with any substance. A good filmmaker (not Renny Harlin) wouldn’t have the announcer tell us every friggin’ thing.

Besides all this, Driven is filled with lots of MTV-type moments showing race tracks, fans, crew guys randomly fixing thing, vendors, local babes dressed in regional-specific skimpy clothing. Oh, and there’s lots of ooh-aah shots of race cars zooming around corners, pitting and getting their wheels removed. Then there are these spinning, retracting, panning, tracking shots of race cars, as if the camera itself were glorifying the idea of race, or maybe exploiting it for cheap thrills. It’s like race car porn. Notice, though, how when they crash it looks like vinyl siding from Sears splits off from the car in massive chunks. Oh and there’s more. Check out the random stuff, like a girl eating a Mexican churro, Gina Gershon applying mascara, a pool game gone terribly wrong and Burt Reynolds in a wheelchair. I’ve thought this out, and the only reason to have Burton Leon Reynolds in a wheelchair is because it’s twisted irony that a race car manager can’t actually walk. A design that’s even more twisted: Mr. Reynolds spends the entire movie stuck in a chair that doesn’t move because of a … wait for it … a flat tire. Booyah!

He’s not the only one that has it rough, though. Check out Kip Pardue, who acts as if his performance in this movie determines the fate of a litter of puppies. And apparently Kip Pardue really hates puppies. His poor brother in the movie, Henry or Tom or something, gets to be the bad agent who dispenses advice that is usually reserved for bad agents. We know he’s bad because he wears more black than Johnny Cash at a gothic funeral. And poor Sly, he just drowns in this tremendously stupid picture. At one point, to prove his authenticity, Sly's character flicks quarters on the track and then drives, drifts and power slides over them at 185 mph. The sequence is so ridiculous it shall forever be known as the Quarter Incident. Another scenes gets close to topping it, but comes up short. The scene: a car has turned over in a puddle and the driver is going to drown unless he gets help. Does the safety crew save the day? Nope. Two drivers turn around on the track, race through oncoming traffic and stop near the puddle so they can hop out of their cars to save the day before a gas leak and a burning bush end the sequence with a roasty-toasty driver barbecued inside his own car. If race-track safety crews have a union they should protest this movie immediately; it makes them look like fools.

I thoroughly hated this movie. Is it obvious? I’m a moderate Formula 1 fan, so I hated it for a variety of reasons beyond just its overall composition and quality. But ignoring its bogus interpretation of racing, Driven has no redeeming value to society. It’s an abomination to film, to acting, to automobiles. And the six years between now and its release haven’t helped it improve its reputation — even today it sucks. You want to know a more interesting movie? What about a documentary on how Renny Harlin has been allowed to actually get behind any camera, be it a windy-box disposable camera or an IMAX 70mm. I want to see that film. Twice. And own the DVD, as long as Renny doesn’t get residuals.

So, there you have it, Driven Bad and Cabin Boy Bad. Liking bad moves is OK by me. As long as they admit they're bad and face the music, or the firing squad. Whichever comes first.

Writers note: Several thoughtful readers have pointed out that Formula 1 team owner Frank Williams is in a wheelchair after a car accident in France in 1986. So maybe Burt Reynolds' placement in Driven is not so far-fetched.

Tom Morello is a genius ... the first time

This is simply a blog test, to make sure I know what I'm doing, which is very unlikely ... we'll see. I was thinking about underrated guitar solos amidst the staccato terror of Tom Morello's first Rage Against the Machine album. Talk about supremely talented playing -- the guy was seriously inventing four different styles all at once. My favorite solo, though, is on "Settle for Nothing," a throw-away track on an album known for "Killing in the Name Of," which radio stations butcher beyond recognition. Back to "Settle for Nothing" ... the solo is exquisite, like Wes Montgomery playing with heroin dripping from his fingers. And then one track later, "Know Your Enemy," another terrific song with a stellar solo. They're solos in the classical style, yet they are exploding with contemporary energy. If you haven't heard them yet, please do yourself a favor and pack your bags for 1992 pre-Global Warming weather.