it’s the final showdown. Remy’s Ratatouille creation vs. the Grim Eater, Anton Ego. This scene really gets me going. For starters, it’s a fantastically beautiful creation of food — all those colorful layers and hearty veggies, masterfully compiled in a little stack and topped with a chive. It is now on my bucket list idea to recreate this little masterpiece of a dish and to visit the famous restaurant, The French Laundry in Napa Valley where it was invented and inspired into existence.
The progression and camera movement in this scene is wonderful. There’s so much detail yet the story is able to be told with just a few words. The use of slow-motion and extreme close-ups of Anton eating, combined with the warping-zoom as we travel through his pupil and enter his mind for a flashback of his childhood. It’s here where the scene really straps us in for the emotional ride.
It’s warmly lit and a young Anton stands in the doorway, looking scrawny, a little awkward and cute, he gives a sniffle of what’s cooking. And then we see mom, glowing in the light from the kitchen window cooking up what we presume is ratatouille stew in the kitchen. No seated at the table, she sets him down a bowl and gently touches his face. If you’re human, her computer-animated hand and tender touch manages to melt your heart and waters your eyes. Whatever crazy childhood you grew up with, there’s the tenderness of a mother’s love that makes you want to weep and ache in your chest. Little Anton tastes and glows with joy over the meal and then we warp back to present Anton at the restaurant, shocked by the meal that just rocked him back to his childhood.
Defeat of the sour and fearsome critic is punctuated by a slow-motion fall of the mighty weapon that his pen. It signals Remy’s Ratatouille as a total knockout. The grim food lover has finally rediscovered his joy in a good meal, and it just tickles you to see him smile and indulge in his second bite with giddy delight. An entire character arc is made with just this taste. The gravity of this beautiful moment is piggybacked with humor, as the camera moves right over to Skinner, the true villain of the film who now tries it, loves it, but hates it. You see each expression all over his face — it’s so good he can’t help it, but he’s ultimately enraged by its success. Without dialogue, the animators take us along a range of expressions and perfectly show what he’s feeling…. and it’s hilarious. Five stars from me.