"I committed to keeping the animation start date," Bird said, "which is like the start date of principal photography, to hold to the original [opening] date. It was like Vulcan chess when you are, like, on four or five different levels. It was scary and exhilarating."
The basic plot line and the cast of characters are the same as in Pinkava's versions. But Bird made some major changes.
"Gusteau [the chef] was alive in the previous version, but I killed him off and made him part of Remy's imagination," he says.
He also took Collette, a self-disciplined young cook in Gusteau's who falls for Linguini, from a minor character to a major player.
"I wrote a whole new script and then we blasted it into production," he says.
"Ratatouille" marks Bird's first "talking critter movie." But he's no stranger to animating animals, having trained at Disney: "The whole Disney thing is: If you are dealing with an animal movie, know something about the animals.
"All the guys who trained me are of that camp, so if you are doing a dog movie, study those type of dogs, then use it not as something to rigidly adhere to, but as something that informs your creative choices."
Bird encouraged his animators to study rat behavior and how they use their noses and their tendency to fold their arms onto their chest.
"Because our lead character is a rat who wants to move into the human world, let's show him make that choice to be on two legs and let's make him being on two legs something he has to hide from his dad and let's show it as something that changes over the course of the film. I am happy we made that choice because it is something I could use as a director."
Bird says that Remy and his rat family have a lot in common with the lead character in another Disney animated film, "The Hunchback of Notre Dame."
"Everybody cringes when they first see the Hunchback," says Bird. "But when you get beyond the surface you start to feel things for the character, and that becomes a deeper film."
susan.king@latimes.com
