Awesome / Ratatouille

• Rémy has no idea that the colony have been living in Paris, all this time. Cue the Establishing Shot of the city, to the tune of "Wall Rat".
• Colette's opening speech/rant to Linguini, swiftly followed by her tough love Training Montage with the new garbage boy. She starts as intimidating, then moves to authoritative as a master of the kitchen and then irresistible when she thanks her protege for listening to her with respect.
  Here, let me make it easy to remember. Keep your station clear...or I WILL KILL YOU!
• Ego's "perspective" line. It was badass in a more subdued way. The same is true for his "I don't like food, I love it. If I don't love it, I don't swallow". The line itself is brilliantly hammy on its own, but the incredible growl Peter O'Toole manages to put into the last word is truly spectacular. Watch it here.
  • Linguini's line beforehand was pretty good. Anton Ego remained composed and pretty smug when he suddenly appears to talk to Linguini; after he calls Linguini 'slow for someone in the fast lane,' Linguini replies that Ego is thin for someone who likes food. Anton actually hesitates briefly and looks surprised, as do the reporters. From what it looks like, it's the first time someone talked back at him, and it was by Linguini of all people.
  • Linguini's entire character development, period. Remy became his own chef in this movie, but Linguini became his own hero. Someone who was a stuttering, wishy-washy klutz with no life direction into a young man who's got enough of a spine and self-respect to fight back against any voice or claim that he's worthless. Not only that, but this film also impressively misses the trap of having him letting the fame get caught up to his head, still understanding that, just like he was when he was first hired at Gusteau's, he's only here to help get the job done. That's an hugely impressive and admirable strength for anybody, cook or no cook.
• In a mixture of a moment of awesome and heartwarming, we have Rémy coming back to Linguini after Skinner kidnaps him. As Linguini flounders at the restaurant as his coworkers pressure him to cook, Rémy shows up. The other chefs see him and react accordingly, rushing over to kill the rat. What does Rémy do? He puffs up his chest and stands his ground, fully trusting Linguini to intervene, which he (naturally) does. It's this moment that truly cements the bond between Rémy and Linguini.
• Rémy's dad gets a CMOA when he rallies the rat colony to replace the kitchen staff and they succeed.
  "We're not cooks... but we are family."
  • The scene of the colony substituting the deserting cooks, period. Not all humans are able to simply cook food, but here are a couple hundreds of small rats, those who scrap trash all their lives, who not only manage to do so, but actually excel in servicing the harshest critic in Paris with only occasional instructions from Rémy.
  • Rémy himself for being able to direct the entire kitchen smoothly, keeping every order straight.
• Rémy, when he argues against his father's hopeless philosophy that nature cannot be changed with a profound statement about his hope to become more than what he is.
  Rémy: No.
  Django: What?
  Rémy: No. Dad, I don't believe it. You're telling me that the future is, can only be, more of this? (gestures to the rat-catcher's shop)
  Django: This is the way things are. You can't change nature.
  Rémy: Change is nature, Dad. The part that we can influence, and it starts when we decide.
  • The very next sentence also counts, since it shows Rémy's Determinator personality.
    Django: Where are you going?
    Remy: With luck, forward.
• Linguini at the climax, when he has to be the sole waiter for the entire restaurant. He handles the role with lightning efficiency, showing that maître d' is his true calling.
  • He waits tables on roller skates. Without spilling anything, or crashing into/tripping over anything either.
  • He's also very quick to step up to the task. The moment he realizes they have a shot at pulling off the dinner rush, he bursts out his office and knowingly states someone needs to wait tables.
• Anton Ego, when he writes his review, putting his own role in perspective while praising Rémy's culinary genius to the skies, knowing that he is likely sacrificing his career to do it.
  • Ego's Tear Jerker flashback to his mother's kitchen is a CMOA for the filmmakers.
  • "I can't remember the last time I told the waiter to give my compliments to the chef!" Coming from Ego, this is a pretty big compliment.
  • Ego may not have licked the plate, but he did wipe the sauce off with his finger and licked it clean, which is about as close as you can to licking the plate. That coming from a critic is a pretty big gesture in of itself.
  • When Colette tells him that he must wait until all other customers have gone before he can meet the chef, Ego takes them up on it. They presumed that he would consider it too outlandish a request to entertain, but he does so and is implied to have stayed there long after everyone has left. The meal shook him to the core so much that come hell or high water, he must meet the source of it.
  • Ego's final line in the film. "Surprise me!"
• Heck, even an IMAGINARY character gets one. Rémy's figment of Chef Gusteau giving a motivational speech.
• Horst: "I killed a man...with THIS thumb!" Then he threatens Skinner with the exact same thumb. We then see him bodily thrown from the restaurant, implying that there may have been some truth to that one.
• The Training Montage Remy and Linguini go through to perfect their puppeteering of the human. It starts off being pretty much a disaster, due to Linguini being blindfolded, but by the end they're able to handle the knife without worrying about injury. At one point when Linguini knocks something off the counter, Remy notices and makes him catch it and seamlessly goes back to cooking.
• The entire chase sequence with Remy trying to keep Skinner from getting the documents that prove Linguini is Gusteau's son. Not only does Remy get through busy traffic unscathed, he manages to outrun Skinner while the latter's on a motor scooter, repeatedly stays one step ahead of him when they're jumping across boats and eventually glides to safety using the stolen documents while Skinner takes a watery plunge.
• Linguini starts to run out of the kitchen after Skinner fires him. After Linguini runs past Horst, Horst stops him by reaching back and grabbing the back of Linguini's collar without even looking. This man has some incredible precision.

---