Word: rodent
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Dates: during 2000-2009
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...issues are the task of any local government. But few places bring quite as much passion to the day-to-day problems of city life as Cambridge does. Case-in-point: the rat problem. Though the councillors themselves have rarely delved into discussions of the city’s rodent infestation in the past two years, citizen speakers are often eager to bring the pest problem to the councillors’ attention. The Cambridge Department of Public Works (DPW) operates a rat hotline, where citizens can report rat sightings or get help keeping rats from entering their house. DPW also...
...crops, unwittingly creating an alluring new habitat for the vole. "Since the late 1980s we have seen occasional cycles in which large numbers of voles, drawn by these new food sources, have appeared in the northern part of Castilla-León," says biologist Juan José Luque, a rodent specialist at the University of Valladolid. "What's extraordinary this year is that, instead of declining over the winter, the population exploded...
...little group portrait of new animation, Ratatouille - a rat-out-of-sewer fable about Remy, the country rodent who tries to fulfill his dream of making great food by befriending a jerky kid named Linguini in a Paris restaurant - is the most familiar face. It has the format (a journey of self-discovery and friendship) and virtues (grace of movement, narrative power) of Pixar, the pioneer foremost practitioner of CGI features. It has set pieces worthy of the old Disney masters, as when Remy, on his first night in Paris, scurries and jetes to avoid the heavy footfalls of pedestrians...
...callow scullery lad named Linguini. Remy, in the logic of animated features, understands the boy's words, but Linguini can't speak rat; so the two communicate through Remy's nods and brow furrowings. Somehow, the kid gets the message. "I can't cook ..." Linguini says, and the rodent shakes his head no. "But you can?" Remy answers with a Gallic shrug so eloquent it says many things. First, a modest "Eh, a little." Beneath that: "Well, not to brag, but I'm actually quite proficient." Most important: "Trust me. Together we'll cook up some magic...
Charlie Chaplin and the other great silent-movie clowns knew how to express the deepest, subtlest emotions through gesture. Remy, too, in the hands of director Brad Bird and his gifted animators, is a veritable Shakespeare of shrugs. The suppleness with which Remy scoots through both human and rodent worlds lends Ratatouille the believability at the center of Pixar classics like John Lasseter's Toy Story, Andrew Stanton's Finding Nemo and Bird's own The Incredibles...