Ratatouille Review

Ratatouille is the best film I've seen in a long time. While the images were great on their own that isn't good enough by itself to make a great film. The story has heart and soul. It is not a summer blockbuster type film and that is just fine. It is a story that is very moral. Yes, the good guys lie and cheat and steal trying to do the best for themselves, but it is only after they confess and make amends that their true abilities come forth. 

Reme just wants to have food that tastes good but his abilities were about more then being just a food sniffer or even a chef. Linguine just wanted to keep his job. They weren't losers, just not in the right place doing the right things for them. 

After Reme gets separated from his family as they try to escape from a shotgun wielding little old lady riding a cookbook he ends up in the sewers of Paris, though he doesn't know it yet. We see a wonderful set of vignettes introducing us to Paris before the big reveal at the top.

It is the astonishing attention to detail that is most brilliant thing about Pixar. We come into a world that feels like it existed before the movie starts and will continue beyond the end, but not as an obvious sequel bait or happily ever after, just life continuing on.

That was one of the most disappointing parts of the Star Wars prequels it was lots of fun but had no depth like this or The Lord of the Rings.

The food was brilliant, they took cooking lessons and it showed. We were so hungry afterwards but chose to do something better then the standard fast food burger joint. They really understand foodies; food is more then fuel and it was amazing how well they were able to translate that to the big screen. The climatic shot captured it completely, it was beautiful. 

Not everyone is a foodie, that is okay, though we have a friend who grow up in a family where they called a three course meal, meat, potatoes and a vegetable. Usually it was just a single food item like hamburger or potato. 

It has heart and the characters are deep and complex, far more so then is usual. The character development time is well spent, it is not an action feature and don't even try confusing it with one. Though the big chase scene with Skinner chasing Reme across Paris was great, that bit with the tablecloth was choice.

I loved the characters, Colette was great a tough, no-holes barred up-and-comer, with real heart.

The pivotal character was Alton "The Grim Reaper" Ego, food critic. He just comes on scene at the very end but even then he steals it completely. It is amazing what the power of love can do. 

I highly recommend this film and plan on buying it later.

Massive GTD Resource List | zen habits

Massive GTD Resource List | zen habits: "My tribute to all the GTD junkies out there (a group that includes me) — a massive list of GTD stuff. It’s far from comprehensive, but who can be comprehensive on a topic this huge?"

A honking big list I need to keep handy for myself.

Social Bookmarking

Social Poster - Best Social Bookmarking Solution yet? | Tech Spikes : "Well, now apparently Social Poster allows you to submit links to 34 social sites including Digg, Reddit, Technorati, Stumbleupon, del.icio.us and more."

I'll need this later

Safari 3 Rocks

Safari has one absolutely great feature no one else seems to have talked about yet.

The in-page search really stands out now. In Safari 2 and the other browsers I've used the in-page search has been rather understated: a simple highlight, that may be in the middle or bottom on the page never consistent and often plain hard to find.


Safari 3 changes all that.


No only is the page darkened and the word highlighted in orange with a white background, it is also magnified. As you got to the next one the previous one is still highlighted so you can see where you just were.

I really like this and it is great. I can't remember how often I've searched and missed something because the highlighting wasn't noticeable enough.

Great job Apple, but why didn't you mention this?

Steve Jobs WWDC2007 Keynote

That was maybe not one of the most exciting keynotes Steve has given, mainly because he's talked about almost all of it before.

Stacks was new to the keynote but a patent showed up on that years ago. It is really great to see it come up. Though to be honest about it I've been doing something similar for ages, I put Home, Applications, and a few other folders in the dock to accomplish the same thing.

The Core Animation stuff looks wonderful. I presume he was using a maxed out Mac Pro, I wonder if that cool animated video search tool is going to be available or was just a developer plaything. I also wonder if a MacBook could handle all that video playing at once.

A lot of developers are bummed over not getting a real SDK for the iPhone. In all likelihood one will be forthcoming in time but not now.

Going cross platform with Safari is pretty interesting. I am going to be thinking about that a bit more.

That huge picture of the Library of Congress was great. You could almost read the titles on the books when he zoomed in all the way. And that the title he added was smooth all the way in was awesome.

I am still curious about the other 290 features that are coming to Leopard will be. Actually Apple's website lists a whole bunch though I didn't count them. I am really impressed by the new voice they have, that will be nice.