Armand nice, charming, sweet. a fairy - tale from old and precise recipes. a delight. and seed of special joy. because the princess, the sad kingdom, the silky moral lesson are at perfect place. but, more important, the hero is magnificent. and very special. a family film. or just a form of magic in the era of blockbusters. a beautiful work in which each detail is important. because it is a story about old fashion virtues - courage, truth, honor, honesty. and respect for duty. and a new mouse in middle of action is not bad thing. maybe for be conscience for a sad rat. and Charming Prince for a young girl. and model for public. because message is simple - the identity is more important than voice of majority. always.

Hatokirei I truly enjoyed this movie although I do have to agree with some posters and their question of ratings. Personally I didn't find anything terrible about it and would allow my 8 or 9 year old to watch, possibly 7 if I felt they where able to handle it. I grew up watching the visually amazing cinematic accomplishments like Dark Crystal, Labyrinth, Watership Down (that one was horrible for a child), and The Secret of Nimh, while I never found those scary (except Watership) I can imagine some parents wouldn't want their young ones to watch them either.From a story stand point, The Tale of Despereaux is lovely; the animation is quite stunning with the colors running more towards the dark then the light (since the sun went away). It's a fairly classic tale, brave mouse gets ostracized for being brave (different) and banished to be eaten by the rats. One rat takes him in and they become friends. All through out there are different characters with their own personal stories emerging which all in all I found well done. The cast was amazing with some well known actors lending their voices, while personally I didn't like Matthew Brodericks voice as Despereaux, I still think he did a fine job of it. I think it's a movie worth watching for adults and older children, but I would think a PG rating would be better suited.

Neddy Merrill Tale of Desperaux is a surprisingly violent and frightening film for a cartoon movie with a "G� rating with a story not strong enough to overcome some of the more unsavory scenes including a princess who is nearly eaten by rats. With "Hotel for Dogs� mercifully sold out (don't smirk - "Paul Blart Mall Cop� is kicking ass at the box office), we saw this instead thinking given its literary pedigree it must be worthwhile. It turned out to be a fairly gritty fairy tale that made little sense. The animation did have that nursery rhyme book look and the vocal talent is first rate. Unfortunately, they didn't have much to say.

TheLittleSongbird 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