Ratatouille with Paul McDonald and Allen Arnold
This week on the Men at the Movies podcast, we travel to France and discuss Ratatouille. Everyone in this movie has identity issues, listening to who the world told them they are. The antagonist in this movie is the fear of believing who we could be. But creativity is seeing a world that doesn’t exist, and working to make that vision a reality. Through embracing our unique gifts and passion, we transform ourselves and the world around us. Pour yourself a glass of something delicious, and let’s discover God’s truth in this movie.
Quotes
Everyone in this movie has identity issues.
His identity was fractured by his community because he was the only one who was drawn to his passion.
Anyone can be creative.
Creativity is seeing what might happen before it has happened.
We are all creative. Some of us just haven’t discovered what that means for us yet.
God reaches to us through the doorway of our passion, our imagination, and our gift.
If the enemy can’t talk us out of pursuing our gift, it will be immediately downgraded.
Our future is influenced by our choices and decisions.
“If you focus on what’s left behind, you’ll never see what’s ahead.”
The people that change the world aren’t the ones simply following a recipe. They’re creating their own recipes.
Following the recipe is safe, because if you fail you can blame the recipe. But if you do something different and it fails, it’s on you.
Don’t give me your version of Superman or Han Solo. Make your own super hero. Create a new world. Remy wasn’t trying to be Gusteau part 2, he was cooking his own dreams.
Your creativity is your expression of your identity.
It’s easy to be a critic of what other people create without risking anything on our own.
The antagonist in this movie is the fear of believing who we could be.
Imagine what could be, and step into that with God, and watch the atmosphere around you change for good.
“The truth sounds insane sometimes. That doesn’t stop it from being true.”
Stop believing who the world tells you that you are, and you can step into who you were born to be.
Themes
The movie is a very sensory experience. While watching it, you should light a candle, drink some wine, engage your other senses.
Remy grew up in a community where his gift and passion were not appreciated. Rats are happy just to survive, living off the crumbs. “Food is fuel.” Focus on not dying, hiding. The world is a scary place and we must live carefully.
The focus of the movie is on identity, and how our identity is formed through our creativity. Remy has to determine who he is as a rat who loves to cook. He is caught in between worlds.
Defining creativity: Seeing something that could be better, and engaging to make that vision become a reality. Your only limit is your soul, which is unlimited. Envisioning a future that doesn’t exist, and work to make it a reality. The purpose of our creativity is to recapture the past and see new possibilities for the future, to recapture the joy in what had become joyless.
Our pursuit of our creative gifting is opposed—reduced to mundane, refused to pursue, shamed to minimize. Neither side invited Remy to pursue his passion with them, both sides full of reasons why it wouldn’t work.
Identity and creativity are intertwined. Your creativity is your expression of your identity.
“Anyone Can Cook” both slows down Remy from catching up to his family and keeps him afloat and alive without them. Represents his belief that he can be what he wants to be, keeps him alive, but takes him on a different path. He’s using his dreams to navigate. But at one point he has to leave the book behind (book knowledge) to experience life and accomplish his dreams.
“A cook makes. A thief takes.” We settle for the first chunk of bread that we see, but we should keep climbing to see where we are.
The idea of following the recipe/rules vs breaking the rules/changing the recipe. How do we know when to follow the recipe and when to improvise? A lie of the enemy is that we have to follow a formula or do it like other “successful” people did. Following the recipe feels safe—if you follow the recipe and it fails, you can blame the recipe. If you improvise and fail, the burden falls on you. There are things that won’t work, and you learn not to do it again. But wouldn’t you rather try and fail, then not try anything that works?
Someone else’s creativity can spark our own dreams and creativity. Recaptures lost joy. Our creativity doesn’t just transform us, but the world around us.
Linguini’s gift allowed him to embrace and discover something crazy and new. His willingness to embrace the new kept Remy alive and became the catalyst for Remy becoming a cook and Ego’s transformation.
Resources
“I’m not asking you to take them out of the world, but to keep them safe from the evil one. 16 They do not belong to this world any more than I do.” - John 17:15-16 (NLT)
Something inside has been awakened. I can no longer be who I was before. But if I am no longer who I was, who am I to be? - Stephen Lawhead in the Song of Albion
Tradition is not wearing your Grandfather's hat. It's buying a new one like he did. - Mark Twain
It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs, who comes short again and again, because there is no effort without error and shortcoming; but who does actually strive to do the deeds; who knows great enthusiasms, the great devotions; who spends himself in a worthy cause; who at the best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement, and who at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who neither know victory nor defeat. - Theodore Roosevelt
Story of With: A Better Way to Live, Love, and Create by Allen Arnold
Questions
What’s your favorite restaurant? Meal?
What is one of your favorite things to do? What do you enjoy deeply? It could be hiking, gardening, woodworking, cooking, flying, exercising…what fills your heart with passion?
How have other people responded to your passion?
How have you lost your passion? Where did it go?
Do you relate to the rats in the movie—just trying to survive, not die, doing enough to get by? Or do you embrace your passion, even though it’s risky?
What does it mean to be creative?
What future do you envision that you feel called to create? How has that been opposed?
Where do you feel caught in between worlds—not a human, not a rat?
What does it mean to be true to yourself?
When do you follow the recipe? When do you go off script?
Why are you drawn to repeat what’s been done before?
What would it feel like to improvise?