The Tale of Despereaux (*1/2)

THE TALE OF DESPEREAUX

This review isn't in the Christmas spirit but Tale of Despereaux blew. I have a standing rule that I don't see any animated movies that aren't from Pixar. Broke the rule because my niece wanted to see this. Sometimes rules are made to be broken, but that rule exists for a good reason. Shoddy, awful script that needed a serious rewrite and doctoring; no way that script should have gone into production. Not a single character said anything interesting or clever and there was no one to root for. The main character Desperaux is an underwritten collection of dull cliches, and the rest of the characters were even less developed. The storytelling is as full of holes as the cheese the mice eat. Gloomy and cheap-looking animation compared to Pixar. There was no humor or joy. The mice and rats can speak but the movie plays fast and loose with when people can hear the rodents and when they can't. There's a theme involving cooking soup that Ratatouille did far better. Even the voice acting sounded trite, especially the narration by Sigourney Weaver, which at times entered Mohinder on Heroes territory for insipidness. Unless you're 6 years old, this movie sucked.