davecruse77 Daughter read the book 2x's. We read together. It appears the book is very dramatic and does not come across with the film. It appears a hard one to get it right with the movie because lots of details with the book. It's an ultimate, I can do it no matter what, book with love at it's theme. May take a few attempts with movie but I can see this really being a movie, smash hit, someday. the book really centers on being a Queen and focusing on her and the penalties of not being in line with the kings commandments. No soup/utinceles for the country due to reaction of rat falling in the soup. It contains so many moral decisions and hard to focus on one for movie. it really made our daughter think and the underlieing theme is being kind and romantic. It appears to be a romance book of fighting for love for the queen and those less fortunate. However, lots of other, many, moral tones in the book. Lots to think about.

K Fong (kfong89) The qualities: - Superb graphics, expressive, beautiful and stylish; - Solid characters, both intrinsically and visually; - A compelling atmosphere, and mood in general.The flaws: - A chaotic script, confusing and unprofessional. They were too ambitious to keep as much as possible of the novel's sub-plots and secondary characters, but didn't know how to organize them according to the screen-writing rules.A linear direction: everything flows on too uniformly, the important scenes are not accented and developed enough. As such, it gradually becomes boring, and during the culminating moments it's positively anticlimactic.The disadvantageous comparison with "Oblio". That one had spark! This one is also smart, but less inspired.

Neddy Merrill Tale of Desperaux is a surprisingly violent and frightening film for a cartoon movie with a "G� rating with a story not strong enough to overcome some of the more unsavory scenes including a princess who is nearly eaten by rats. With "Hotel for Dogs� mercifully sold out (don't smirk - "Paul Blart Mall Cop� is kicking ass at the box office), we saw this instead thinking given its literary pedigree it must be worthwhile. It turned out to be a fairly gritty fairy tale that made little sense. The animation did have that nursery rhyme book look and the vocal talent is first rate. Unfortunately, they didn't have much to say.

mossfoot I just saw this movie again, and stand by my original assessment of it. It's an underrated classic, with far more depth than most family movies. On the one hand it's more simplistic than, say, a Pixar film. It's more of a fairy tale like The Little Prince. And while I don't care for the character designs too much (though they do have an artistic charm to them), from a writing standpoint I would put Despereaux on par with the best Pixar films, maybe more so.Most of the main characters are seriously damaged, yet believably human (even the rodents). The way some characters fall from grace is more believable than anything Lucas came up with in Star Wars III.If it has a failing it's with some of the secondary characters, such as the Soup Maker's assistant (made up of vegetables) which just didn't really seem necessary.But the themes of anger, regret, sadness, depression, and the power of forgiveness makes this a movie I feel more children should be exposed to. It's a very much a children's movie, but deals very much with adult themes.