Originally Posted By TALL Disney Guy ^^^My guess is it's "Rat-a-TOO-ee". I haven't seen anything about this film yet, so have no opinion. <I have to admit that I am not exactly a racing fan, and I am not partial to hillbillys, so during the opening scene of Cars I was not too optimistic, but the movie was wonderful.> Racing, hillbillies...man, "Cars" should be a SMASH here in Kentucky! ;-) <I remember how excited my boys were to get their Susan action figures at McDonald's, complete with horn lifting action!> markedward, may I just say your boys have wonderful taste. Even though I was deeply disappointed in that film, Susan was my favorite character since she is my favorite from the books.
Originally Posted By DlandDug The trailer for Ratatouille attached to Cars includes a phonetic spelling of the title. I believe it is Rat-a-too-ee. So they are already addressing the issue.
Originally Posted By smeeeko ^^yes you are right they do have the pronunciation so people say can say it. The rat is named after an eggplant dish. =)
Originally Posted By Liberty Belle I haven't seen a preview for Ratatouille, but I've heard good reports from people who have so I'll keep an open mind. Honestly, though - and I know I'm VERY much in the minority here - I don't usually find the Pixar movies that funny or interesting. Maybe I'd enjoy a slightly more "challenging" movie outside of their usual zone a bit more.
Originally Posted By trekkeruss Perhaps you should see Cars then, if you haven't already. It's outside the usual zone, IMO.
Originally Posted By Liberty Belle ^^^ I haven't had a chance to see it yet - I'm hoping to see it this weekend. I *love* the look of the animation, haven't seen much about storyline yet but hopefully I'll enjoy it
Originally Posted By markedward <<I remember how excited my boys were to get their Susan action figures at McDonald's, complete with horn lifting action!> markedward, may I just say your boys have wonderful taste. Even though I was deeply disappointed in that film, Susan was my favorite character since she is my favorite from the books.> Oh, Tall Disney Guy. My sincerest apologies. Sarcasm so often falls flat on discussion boards. I was suggesting that there are wonderful stories that do not lend themselves so well to merchandizing. The boys were, in fact, quite disappointed by the whole Lion the Witch and the Wardrobe era at McDonalds,including Susan. We read the book with our 7 year old. He really liked the book, and got into that universe. I'm sure we will read another Narnia book early this summer. But he had no interest in seeing the movie (just a scary action movie in his opinion) or in its merchandizing.
Originally Posted By TALL Disney Guy Ah...so I have egg on my face. Well, it ain't the first time. Even though it's a bit embarrassing, thanks for saying what you really meant, LOL. When I read it last night I thought your wording there was humorous, and now that I read it with sarcasm it really is funny, LOL. <---sometimes a bit too naive for his own good By the way, if you ever have Narnian thoughts/ideas/questions, please feel free to e-mail me (it's in my profile---and it'd be fun to find out y'all's "Narnian history" as well).
Originally Posted By markedward Somebody once wrote questioning why anyone outside the industry would care what kind of an opening weekend a movie had. If you like the movie, who cares that it ONLY made ten million dollars, and if you thought it was dumb, its making 100 million doesn't make it any less dumb. But it's just that sort of thing that I wonder about with Ratatouille. I have NO doubt that it will be great. That's the only kind of movie Pixar makes. But I do doubt that kids will beg their parents to take them to McDonalds to collect all the different rats in their happy meals. Or to re-do their rooms in rat sheets. And merchandising isn't just a freeloader. I'm convinced the merchandising can help fuel interest in the movie. That seems to be what I'm seeing with Cars and the four year old boys at my son's preschool. That synergy goes both ways. But I don't mean to get so caught up in that aspect. Thank goodness there is no Oscar given for Best Merchandising. I'm just worried that if The Incredibles does a little less than Finding Nemo, and Cars does a little less than The Incredibles, and Ratatouille does a little less than Cars ... well, these last few months I've enjoyed having my Disney stock be worth something, and I'd hate for that to go away.
Originally Posted By smeeeko perhaps I'm weird (well I am, but that's not my point) but when I saw the trailer for Ratatouille I got really excited about the movie.. maybe not as much as I did for Lilo & Stitch.. but in the same vein of interest, I was looking for anything L&S before the movie came out.. I just felt that good about it.. Ratatouille may not be a L&S but it definitely looks like something I would be making room for on our IVAR shelves for if you know what I mean.. snowglobe, art of book.. plastic cheese toys.. whathaveyou..
Originally Posted By DlandDug During the early years in Hollywood, Walt Disney needed a distributor for his new cartoon character, Mickey Mouse. Being Walt, he went right to the president of the biggest studio in town, MGM. He explained his character to Louis B. Mayer, who was at that time the most powerful man in Hollywood. After the pitch, Mayer turned Disney down flat. His reason: Every woman in the world fears and hates MICE. Wrong them, wrong now. Doesn't matter if this film is full of rats. Pixar's talented crew could make a tarantula appealing. Oh wait! They already did that with Chili in It's Tough to Be a Bug...
Originally Posted By leemac <<They already did that with Chili in It's Tough to Be a Bug...>> Without being overly pedantic Doug but Pixar had virtually nothing to do with It's Tough to Be a Bug. The story goes....late in development for DAK Michael E. felt that the park needed another show to fill out the day. Tree of Life had been designed as just an icon and he felt that a theater would be perfect for it. It struck fear into the hearts of everyone on DAK as it would require a lot of design changes. Ultimately Michael got his way. The theater was added. At a meeting to discuss what could be the show, he leapt up half-way through and told Tom Fitzgerald (then at TPP) and Kevin Rafferty that he "would earn his paycheck then and there!" as he had just seen a rough cut of A Bug's Life. It would be a perfect fit in his mind. However when they contacted Lasseter he told them that they didn't have a chance of getting it ready for April 1998 as they were swamped on the movie. So the movie was written by WDI and the animation was almost entirely outsourced. Kevin Rafferty had to create the entire universe of bugs for the 3D movie as he had such little reference material from Pixar. They couldn't risk featuring a character that might get cut from the final movie which is why it is limited to Flik and Hopper. That is also why Flik is a slightly different color to the Pixar model. <<<------ Full of useless trivia.
Originally Posted By leemac <<I was looking for anything L&S before the movie came out.. I just felt that good about it.. >> Me too smeeeko. I also feel that way about what little I've seen from American Dog too. It looks so good.
Originally Posted By DlandDug Actually, Flik, Hopper and P.T. Flea. <--- also pendantic and full of useless trivia.
Originally Posted By leemac ^^ I'll have to challenge you on that one as P.T. Flea isn't in It's Tough to be a Bug.
Originally Posted By electra thanks all for answering my question about the pronunciation. Heh, I knew I was saying it wrong. My French =horrid.
Originally Posted By DlandDug I had always assumed that the flea who gets zapped by the Termite-ator is supposed to be P.T. Flea.
Originally Posted By Dlmusic I'm pretty sure it's P.T Flea at DCA's version, but I think in Animal Kingdom's version it's just a generic flea.
Originally Posted By leemac ^^ Both shows are from the same film stock. The character definitely isn't credited as being P.T. Flea and Ratzenburger didn't record the voice. The only character references they had were for Flik and Hopper so I think any similarity is a coincidence.
