The Tale of Despereaux (2008)

• Year: 2008
• Released: 19 Dec 2008
• Country: United Kingdom, United States
• Adwords: 1 win & 8 nominations
• IMDb: https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0420238/
• Rotten Tomatoes: https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/The_Tale_of_Despereaux
• Metacritics: https://www.metacritic.com/movie/the-tale-of-despereaux
• Available in: 720p, 1080p,
• Language: English
• MPA Rating: G
• Genre: Animation, Adventure, Comedy
• Runtime: 93 min
• Writer: Kate DiCamillo, Gary Ross, Will McRobb
• Director: Sam Fell, Robert Stevenhagen
• Cast: Matthew Broderick, Emma Watson, Dustin Hoffman
• Keywords: based on novel or book, forgiveness, unlikely friendship, mouse, loyalty,

	6.1/10
	53/100

The Tale of Despereaux Storyline

To celebrate the Royal Soup Day at the annual spring festival in the distant and idyllic kingdom of Dor, the royal chef Andre proudly presents his most intricate and delicious creation for his Queen, only to see it spoiled when the hideous rat Roscuro ruins the celebrations. Under those circumstances, the inconsolable King then banishes all rats and soup from Dor sinking the Kingdom and its good citizens into melancholy, however, in Mouseland, Despereaux, a teeny tiny mouse with big ears refuses to cower and decides to take matters into his own two little, yet capable hands. Of course, when you are so small, even for a mouse, the world can be a dangerous place, but on the other hand, when your heart is brave, nothing can stand against your dreams.

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The Tale of Despereaux Movie Reviews

Enjoyable Fairy Tale!

It’s sad that movie producers don’t make this kind of movie anymore. This is a classic, wonderful fairy tale that is good for the whole family. It does have a few flaws such as this movie is too dark for a G-rating. But the movie itself works and it’s not boring like many people say it to be.

This is about a mouse who is different from the rest of the mice. After being kicked out of this tribe, he befriends a rat and together they must save a kingdom from darkness.

This movie has an impressive voice cast. Matthew Broderick does a good job playing the hero mouse.

The animation is pretty good. It looked like the animation was drawn. I liked it though. It reminds me of old Disney movies. In fact, this has a great moral like the rest. I liked this film a lot. I rate this film 8/10.

Nice try, doesn’t quite work though

As a few people know already I am a huge fan of animation, and would immediately see something no matter how good or bad it was. I was interested in The Tale of Despereux, it actually looked interesting, and naturally I wanted to see how much justice it did to one of my favourite books, written by Kate DiCamillo.

I have to say, The Tale of Despereux was a bit of a disappointment. Not terrible, but it could have been better, considering the source material. I have to admit though, the animation is wonderful. I admit I was more impressed by the backgrounds and colours than the character designs, the character designs were good in general but the backgrounds were nicely rendered and the colours were suitably bold and bright. Also the music is beautiful, it had lovely motifs and a sense of adventure, and the message was a nice one. And I was surprised at the voice acting, it was very good on the whole. Initially, I wasn’t sure of some of the choices, but all did well. Emma Watson is good enough, but Dustin Hoffmann, Kevin Kline and Robbie Coltrane are great. Wasn’t sure about Matthew Broderick though. He can be likable and above average, but he flounders when his characters are badly underwritten or poorly explored, which was sadly the case here.

I think I would have had a better reaction to The Tale of Despereux if I hadn’t read the book. I do try to judge films by their own merits, but for those who haven’t read the book or are considering reading it, I want to share my opinion. It is a wonderful book, full of memorable characters, exciting and poignant stories, a great atmosphere and a full emotional punch at the end. On its own, this film is reasonable, as an adaptation it is sadly quite poor. Some of the characters are poorly explored, particularly Despereux who is disappointingly bland, while Roscuro doesn’t come close to the complex character he is in the book. The story is a bit of a mess, it had a great idea, but some of it felt rushed and skimmed over, while scenes were unfocused and pointless. I really wasn’t taken with the subplot about soup, sorry but that felt somewhat superfluous to the story. Worse was the script, the actors delivered very well but some of the dialogue is pretty bad, instead of being intelligent, funny, poignant or thought-provoking, it came across as trite and hackneyed.

Overall, reasonable attempt but doesn’t quite work. Oh, and for those who haven’t read the book and weren’t taken with the movie, you may find the book is much more worthwhile. 5/10 for the animation, voice cast and music. Bethany Cox

Nice animation but story is a mess without much fun

Roscuro the rat visits the kingdom of Dor during the “Royal Soup Day.” Roscuro goes for a closer smell and falls into the Queen’s soup. He scared her to death, and the distraught king bans all soup and rats. Roscuro falls down into the kingdom of rats. Princess Pea despairs over the kingdom’s decline. Then Despereaux is born. He’s a small mice with giant ears who has no natural fears. They try to teach him to cower to no avail. He befriends Princess Pea with the love of books, and the council banishes him to the dungeons for breaking a code about talking to humans. Then he is pit against a cat in the Ratworld arena games.

The animation looks good but the story is way too messy. There are too many story lines going on. The voice work is generally unimpressive especially Despereaux. He lacks energy. Emma Watson is a little better. Coming a year and a half after Ratatouille, the difference in energy and fun between the two is night and day. The movie is better off staying with Despereaux all the way through and introduce Roscuro later. This is a movie that needs a few more rewrites to clean up the messiness. Too bad because there is a good message somewhere in the movie.