This Day in Pixar History: Ratatouille Theatrical Release

On this day in 2007, Pixar's film Ratatouille hit theaters. Ratatouille was directed by Brad Bird and co-directed by Jan Pinkava, and has probably my favorite score of any Pixar film, which was composed by Michael Giacchino. Box office results started off slowly but ended up doing quite well. It had one of the lowest opening weekends for a Pixar film at a little over $47 million and ended its domestic run at $206 million, which places it in the bottom third of Pixar films. Even still, it just missed the top ten domestic box office hits for 2007, ending in 11th place and only $4 million behind 300. It also did very well internationally, making over $417 million which puts it in 4th place for all Pixar films (only behind Toy Story 3, Finding Nemo and Up). Ratatouille won the Academy Award for Best Animated Feature Film and was nominated for 4 other Academy Awards including Best Writing (Original Screenplay), Best Music (Original Score) by Michael Giacchino, Best Sound Editing and Best Sound Mixing. It also won a number of Annie Awards including Best Animated Feature.

Ratatouille was released with the short film Lifted, which marked the directorial debut of Gary Rydstrom. Rydstrom also directed last year's Hawaiian Vacation, which was released with Cars 2, and was to make his feature-length directorial debut with newt until it was cancelled in 2010.

The fictional story of Remy and rats in the kitchen seems to have recently played out in the real world with the closing of the Hidden City Cafe. Well known by Pixar fans, the closing of the Point Richmond, California landmark was the topic of a blog post I wrote last week while visiting the Emeryville area.

This Day in Pixar History: Cars 2 Theatrical Release

One year ago today, Pixar released Cars 2. The John Lasseter/Brad Lewis-directed film opened to the worst critical ratings for any Pixar film, garnering only 38% on Rotten Tomatoes. Fortunately, people are smart enough to make up their own minds and the film made over $66 million in its opening weekend and ended up with over $191 million in total domestic sales. This placed it in the #8 spot for total theatrical grosses for 2011, just behind Mission: Impossible - Ghost Protocol (directed by Brad Bird).

I have previously written of my love of the first Cars film. It may be true that the sequel didn't pull the heartstrings like other recent Pixar films such as Up and Toy Story 3, but it was still a fun and entertaining film with awesome sets, animation and lighting. The opening ocean scene and the one on the streets of Tokyo were amazing.

Cars 2 was released with the short film Hawaiian Vacation, directed by sound-man extraordinaire Gary Rydstrom. Rydstrom has done sound for Pixar films going all the way back to Luxo, Jr..  He made his directorial debut on the short film Lifted.