About midway through watching Up I realized I have a big problem with Pixar. Each Pixar film is so fantastic and I watch it so many times with my son that the previous one is fresh on my mind when I go to see the new one. How is that a problem? Well, I find myself starting to compare the current movie with the previous one and that isn’t a fair judgment to pass. And so it was with Up as I initially found it lacking the same magic of WALL-E. But that is part of the point. Up has a magic all to it’s own that sets it apart from previous Pixar films. The story focuses on the unlikely protagonist Carl Fredricksen (Edward Asner), a seventy-eight year old balloon salesman who finally fulfills a life-long dream, and promise to his deceased wife, when he ties thousands of balloons to his house and sets off on an adventure to South America. Along for the ride is precocious Wilderness Explorer (think Boy Scout) Russell (Jordan Nagai) who is attempting to earn his “assisting the elderly badge”. Along the way the two encounter long-missing explorer Charles F. Muntz (Christopher Plummer), a childhood hero of Carl’s, and Dug, the talking dog (not as corny as it sounds). Intrigue and action ensue. It all sounds rather simplistic, but in true Pixar fashion there are many layers to the story as we learn more about the characters as they learn more about themselves and each other.
Considering this is only the third Pixar film to have the main characters comprised of humans beings (the others being The Incredibles and, partially, Ratatouille), and normal ones at that, this felt like their most emotionally honest story to date. Having previously used anthropormorphized monsters, automobiles, toys, insects and marine life as cyphers for telling their stories, this time the crew from Emeryville give the storytelling heavy lifting to two characters at opposite ends of life. Russel is just beginning to live and is eager to learn, yet lacks a role model to impart on him those valuable lessons that we all learn from adults. Carl, on the other hand, feels he has nothing else to learn and no one left to share his life with. Circumstances get these two compatible puzzle pieces together and the denouement shows us that they are a perfect fit. Characters have always been Pixar’s greatest strength, so much so that the story just seems to fall into place around them like a comfortable blanket. This time around, the unlikely pairing of two characters seventy years apart in age is the exact perfect choice for the tale being told.
Up is directed by Pete Docter, who previously directed Monsters Inc. and worked on the stories for Toy Story, Toy Story 2 and WALL-E. Co-directing is Bob Peterson, who has had a hand in one form or another in about half of the company’s back catalog. The visuals in Up are pretty stunning in places and we even get the added depth of 3D. This is the first Pixar film to get the 3D treatment, however much like all other technology used to make this film, the added effect deftly serves the movie, not the other way around. There are no gratuitous 3D scenes and this movie will look just as amazing viewed in 2D. From the mundane setting of a living room to the grand vista of a South American lanscape the attention to detail is spot on. Each character is imbued with a physicality that matches their personality and everyday objects are as close to real as you can get without live-action filming. The animators at Pixar are masters at their craft and Up exemplifies that in no uncertain terms.
It’s been brought to my attention from many sources that it is perhaps cliched nowadays for critics to gushingly praise anything Pixar produces. However when they, ten films on, consistently produce animated features that outshine not only animated films, but the best that live action has to offer, I only see that as a positive. If all filmmakers took lessons from Pixar’s playbook there would be a noticeable lack of unwatchable motion pictures that overwhelmingly plague the theaters. And wouldn’t that be a fantastic change?
4 responses to “Review: Pixar’s ‘Up’”