The Tale of Despereaux is a 2008 animated adventure comedy film directed by Sam Fell and Rob Stevenhagen (in his feature directorial debut).

The film is narrated by Sigourney Weaver and stars Matthew Broderick, Robbie Coltrane, Dustin Hoffman, Richard Jenkins, Kevin Kline, Frank Langella, William H. Macy, Tracey Ullman, Emma Watson and Ciarán Hinds.

It is the second theatrically released computer-animated film distributed by Universal Pictures, following The Pirates Who Don't Do Anything: A VeggieTales Movie.

However, Roscuro's curiosity leads him to the royal banquet hall, where his accidental plunge into Queen Rosemary's soup triggers a heart attack, claiming her life.

In an effort to teach him to be a "proper mouse", his brother Furlough takes him to the royal library to show him how to chew books, but Despereaux is more interested in reading them, becoming fascinated by their stories.

The "threadmaster", a blind mouse named Hovis, lowers Despereaux into the dungeons using a red thread, where he is presumed dead by the rest of the mice.

Wishing to make amends for the trouble he has caused, Roscuro sneaks into Pea's room and tries to apologize to her, but she lashes out at him, and guards come after him.

As Andre is distracted by a rainy thunderstorm (which was caused by the smell of the soup being released into the sky), Boldo agrees and takes Despereaux back to the dungeons.

Botticelli captures Despereaux, but the rain clouds part and sunlight reflects off a lost heart-shaped locket into the dungeon, stunning the photophobic sewer rats.

Meanwhile, the King finally overcomes his grief and allows soup and rats back into the kingdom; it stops raining, and the sun rises over Dor; Roscuro returns to his life at sea; Despereaux, who also inspired the mice to be brave just like him, departs on a journey to see the world.

The film's production was marred by disagreements and malpractice, or accusations thereof, between the French, British and North American staff.

Sylvain Chomet was employed early by Gary Ross and Allison Thomas as director, before the film was approved for funding by Relativity Media, with pre-production (including character design, the first drafts of the screenplay written by Will McRobb and Chris Viscardi, and the addition of the original character of Boldo) taking place at his studio, Django Films in Edinburgh.

Chomet came up against creative and ethical differences with the producers and was eventually fired from the project and thrown out of the studio space allocated to the film.