1. Let me just start by saying "anthropomorphic mice solving crimes."
2. The movie tries to trick you a few times by making you think it's going to be about humans. But nope, it's about mice.
3. Less than three minutes in, there has already been a kidnapping. By a bat!
4. The filmmakers are straight-up brilliant with implied violence.
5. Shadows are everywhere.
6. Yes, it's a kids' movie, but the dialogue is delightfully over the top.
7. Basil of Baker Street, our crime-solving hero, lives at 221 1/2 Baker St., right underneath his human counterpart, Sherlock Holmes, at 221B Baker St.
Sherlock, meet your mouse match. He also plays violin. His is smaller.
(Holmes is voiced by Basil Rathbone, who played the detective in a series of Sherlock films starting in 1939!)
8. The film explores the tension between two brilliant rodents, both equally vain and equally obsessed with their rivalry.
9. Professor Ratigan murders one of his henchmen for calling him a rat. He feeds the mouse to a huge cat.
10. Basil has a chemistry set that is the wackiest.
11. Have I mentioned that the mice wear clothes? And carry umbrellas?
12. Professor Ratigan is a demented genius, and as if that weren't enough, he also has panache.
13. There are two big musical numbers in this film, and Professor Ratigan's has a harp solo.
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Henry Mancini's score is quite the caper in itself!
14. It teaches children about forensic ballistics!
15. And to be mindful of their drinks!
16. Basil is great at being in disguise.
17. Dr. Dawson is not.
18. Themes of class and disempowerment abound. Do you think a bar full of raucous animals cheers up only when a sexy mouse sings "let me be good to you" by accident?
19. Is it a little exasperating that aside from Olivia, the female characters are basically Basil's beleaguered maid and a comely showgirl? Yes, yes it is.
20. However, Olivia is awesome. She fights Ratigan, even though she's tiny!
21. There's a token queen. Her crown is like a little boop on her little head. She's not very important except that she's technically the target of Ratigan's evil plot.
22. Professor Ratigan creates a Rube Goldberg machine of death, and Basil escapes through nothing but math and audacity.
Nothing but math and audacity.
23. There is an incredible chase through the London skies that ends in a fight to the death on the face of Big Ben.
24. Ratigan, in a maniacal rage, loses his impressive mind and turns to his own physical strength to fight Basil. Like the rat that he is.
25. Basil, of course, triumphs, and he comes around to loving Olivia because she is sassy and awesome.
26. Even better, Basil teams up with Dr. Dawson. Trusted associates 4eva.
27. Also, the newspaper is called the London Mouse.
