The day after Christmas, we went to see The Tale of Despereaux and then meant to go home and make turkey soup.
I liked Despereaux. The story begins with a rather nice sea-rat named Roscuro who was beguiled by his love of Soup into climbing up to a dangerous position, from which he fell into the Queen's bowl... so that she fainted and drowned therein... and the King in his grief unwisely outlawed Rats and Soup as well.
This, of course, ruined the lives of his daughter and all their subjects. (Soup was a Big Deal in the Kingdom of Dor.) Just like when the king is good, the kingdom prospers, when this king ruled badly, his kingdom suffered. It wouldn't rain for years. Everyone began taking out their ruined lives on everyone else, and everyone else retaliated, and the Princess is betrayed and-- well, I shan't tell you, but things get Bad, actually sufficiently Bad that I think the movie deserved a PG rather than a G.
Everything might well have been ruined forever but for Despereaux, an unusually small mouse with large ears who simply wouldn't cower, and read books rather than eating them. His imagination was caught by Courage and Honor and Truth, and he became a gentleman. He gets banished for un-mouse-like behavior ("Are you a man or a mouse?") and promptly goes and starts saving the kingdom.
There aren't many movies where the hero's virtue, especially Capitalized and Made a Point Of, is taken seriously. Or where it works in the plot without being silly. (I'm thinking of Shrek.) Despereaux is funny without being made fun of. The characters aren't perfect, not even the beautiful Princess with long golden hair and the voice of Hermione Granger, but the movie has real evil and takes good things seriously. And when things are set right, it begins to rain again in Dor.
It's a proper fairy tale, in the tradition of proper fairy tales. It was delightful finding it at the movie theater. As we walked out it rained on us, and we went home to make Turkey Soup.
Interesting. I read some reviews that faulted the movie for being overly convoluted and confusing. How did you find it in that respect? And have you read the book? I haven't, but I heard there were some significant changes, as usual.
ReplyDeleteI didn't find the plot particularly convoluted, though it wasn't that tightly written. (Characters would be introduced far into the movie for just one scene, that sort of thing.) I thought events actually avalanched on one another in a causally sensible way, moral-universe-ish-ly speaking. Though there was a serious storyline jump between the first/Roscuro part and the second/Despereaux part.
ReplyDeleteI have read the book, but it was long enough ago I can't really comment on plot differences. I do have a vague impression they weren't the same.
I just read the book in question. :-) Have yet to see the movie.
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