Not everything from the Pixar stables is perfect. Cars was pretty bland, and after its spellbinding first half hour, Wall-E went strictly downhill. But then, along comes a film like Up, a film so fantastically uplifting and so universal in it’s appeal that it’s hard not to be thankful for the joy of being a moviegoer in an age when this animation studio has produced a run of brilliant titles that compares with the golden era of late-1930s Disney.
Up actually begins in the 1930s. A wordless opening depicting the relationship between Carl and Ellie Fredricksen lasts barely five minutes but offers in compacted form more laughter, sorrow and breathtaking beauty than exists in most of the ouput from Hollywood
in any given year.
The characters are wonderfully developed; ther’s Carl, a dreamer and would-be wanderer, sitting in a movie theatre wearing aviator goggles and thrilling at the latest black-and-white newsreel adventures of Charles Muntz (voiced by Christopher Plummer), an action-hero in the mould of Indiana Jones who uses a giant airship to explore exotic lands and discover rare creatures, and whose catchphrase is “Adventure is out there!”
And there, suddenly, is Ellie, another youngster awe-struck by the distant worlds invoked by Muntz. Together they plot and scheme, fall in love, get married, buy a ramshackle home they work hard to fix up. They save every spare dime in a jar so that, one happy day, they can pay for a trip to the legendary Paradise Falls. But the bills mount, their funds dip, and, in a couple of heartbreaking shots, they’re shown dealing with the fact that they’ll never be able to have children.
Over time, their youthful dreams become just that: dreams. They console themselves with each other. Their marriage is tested,but they survive, take care of each other. Soon they sicken, get bent. One day, Ellie doesn’t get up. Carl, now 78 years old, is inconsolable.
It’s one of the most extraordinarily openings to a film, far less an animated film, ever to have been crafted. It dares to risk alienating the young children all the poster and ad campaigns would suggest it’s aimed at. Against the tendency of studios to appease older viewers with a stream of double-entendres and in-jokes, it deluges them with more heart-on-sleeve emotion than a romantic weepie. Most of all, it threatens to topload the drama so that everything that follows might seem a letdown.
The wonder of Up is that it’s loosely enough plotted to float and drift in new directions, to the extent that it’s almost two or three films in one. Nonetheless it never entirely abandons the memory of the sadness, difficult joy and blue-noted consolations of those early scenes.
What about the rest of Up? The central storyline revolves around Carl (Ed Asner), who has begun to curdle into square-jawed, cantankerous widowerdom, chafing against local real-estate developers. They want to pack him off to a nursing home and construct a ghastly development on the hallowed site he and Ellie built into reality.
In an act of truculent independence, and in a last ditch attempt to visit the mythical lost worlds of South America after which he lusted as an adolescent, he ties up thousands of balloons to the roof of his house and sails off into the bright blue beyond to fulfil that dream.
There’s one complication: an 8-year-old boy-scout-type called Russell (Jordan Nagai) happened to be on his porch when the building floated to the heavens. The cussed Spencer Tracey-lookalike and the alarmingly enthusiastic, high-pitched Asian American make for an oddly endearing double-act not so dissimilar from that of Clint Eastwood and Bee Vang in Gran Torino (2008).
Together they fly down to a magical realm full of dense forests and immense waterfalls. All the while, tethered to their portable house, the memories it embodies weighing them down, they’re looking for the spot Ellie had always wanted to go. Along the way, they’re accompanied by a rare 13-foot-tall, chocolate-chomping (female) bird nicknamed Kevin. They’re chased by savage dogs with squeaky voices. Muntz turns out to be different from the hero that Carl had once imagined him.
I approached this films having heard mixed reviews and wlaked out the cinema with a sense that I had seen something quite wonderful. 3D does seem to be back in fashion right now and the Digital Projectors make this a must see at the cinema. Home 3D, with those horrid green and magenta specs, is no comparison to the Real 3D presentation at the cinema. The 3D is a nice touch but the story is so touching, well written and absorbing that you even forget the 3D. This is one of my top 10 films of 2009. Catch it quick.
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Without a doubt, this movie was a screamingly amazing film. I cannot in good conscience ruin any part of this spectacular film for you. Nonetheless, I do recommend it as highly as is humanly possible.
This particular company needed to get in to the North American production profession a long time ago. Instead of leasing out their talent to other companies, they are finally making films by themselves. The great majority of moviegoers are aware that this picture is the companys only real project . And what an amazing starting project!
This picture deserves to be credited for lifting the entire genre to the highest level. The cinematography was excellent and the directing was uncannily good. It was possible to really experience the material breaking into the real world.