“B-” Rating by Robert W. Hammerle

“The Tale of Despereaux” is one those sweet, well done animated films that teach children a number of important lessons, not the least of which is that life is to be embraced and lived to the fullest. Unfortunately, most children under the age of twelve will likely be bored half to death before they ever get a chance to learn anything.

Despite a promising beginning and an admittedly stirring climax, most of this cosmetically attractive film borders on tedium. What little suspense “Despereaux” produces is all but lost in a story that devolves into our little hero endlessly repeating his King Arthur mantra concerning duty, honor and truthfulness. Both of my grandchildren (ages ten and seven) were left squirming uneasily during a great portion of this film, and I’m sure they were not alone in that respect.

Having said that, “Despereaux” did have some genuine warmth and intrigue. The story deals with three separate worlds where humans, mice and rats live and occasionally interact. For his part, Despereaux is a little mouse with big ears and bigger ambition. He wants to see the world, but in doing so challenges all of the basic rules mice are taught to obey. Much to the consternation of the authoritarian adult mice, he won’t scurry or act timid.

To the contrary, Despereaux exasperates his elders by throwing caution to the wind. Instead of eating the pages of books, he wants to read them. Instead of being fearful of humans, he wants to interact with them. He simply is not a mouse who will cower and scamper away into the darkness like all good mice are supposed to do.

In the meantime, the human world is thrown into complete disarray when the King and his kingdom fall into depression after the death of the Queen. During a yearly celebration where all of the inhabitants of the Kingdom of Dor gather to taste a new soup produced by the Castles’ inventive chef (and these people do love their soup!), an adventuresome soup loving rat named Roscuro (Dustin Hoffman) inadvertently ruins the celebration that leads to the Queen’s untimely demise.

Roscuro is soon banned to the rat underworld, where he must confront the reality of a world without any light or the semblance of decent food. Despereaux soon joins him there as a result of his own misadventures. Here they join forces to save a forlorn Princess and her depressed subjects.

Quite frankly, “Despereaux” comes close to killing the audience with kindness and good intentions. While you clearly know that Roscuro and Despereaux will bring light back to the human world, it was hard to sit there without impatiently yelling out, “What in the hell are you two little rodents waiting on?”

At its core, “Despereaux” is a movie about having the courage to face the many unknowns in life. All children are born with a lack of fear, and Despereaux resisted all attempts by his society to teach him to be a coward. In a sense, he developed a sense of courage and adventure at an early age that the cowardly lion was only able to acquire as an adult with the help of Dorothy in the “Wizard of Oz” (1939).

In one of the several wonderful moments of this rather vanilla movie, Despereaux looks perplexed when confronted with the mouse world’s credo, “There are a lot of wonderful things to be afraid of in this world.” But Despereaux inherently knew that to experience those wonderful things, he had to reject that fear and embrace a sense of wonder and adventure.

That may have made him a bad mouse, but he certainly embodied qualities that made him a great role model for children. The pity is that in choosing cuteness over fun, I’m afraid this splendid message will fall on little deaf ears.