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Here’s a movie for dog lovers, the elderly, children of divorce, FOBs (Friends of Birds), old-fashioned Boy Scouts, people yearning for adventure, and anyone who has ever loved… and lost. Up is for everyone. It made me laugh out loud, and it made me bawl.
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I concept it would be tough for Up to match the emotional power of Wall-E. The two Pixar films are similar in their lack of dialogue in the first act, which helps deepen the emotional impact. Up begins with Carl, a skittish young boy star-struck by a notorious explorer; and kookie Ellie, who has a similar obsession. The two kids become rapidly friends, and command to one day fade to Venezuela’s Paradise Falls. After getting married, they remove their dream home and fix it up, hoping to maintain it with children. Carl and Ellie’s life together from childhood through obsolete age is depicted, silently, with delicacy and subtlety. The first 15 minutes is like a celebration of a jubilant marriage, and you truly feel Carl’s injure when he is left alone. He sits slumped in his chair, talking to the house as if it is the missing Ellie.
When developers finish in on Carl’s beloved home, he decides to fulfill his promise to Ellie and disappear to Paradise Falls. A old-fashioned balloon vendor, Carl lifts his home with hundreds of radiant balloons. Stowing away on the porch is Russell, a paunchy, dauntless kid trying to score a scouting badge.
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After landing in Paradise Falls, the traditional man and the tiny boy are joined by a golden retriever named Dug who can talk with his collar, and a grand rare bird that bonds with Russell (he names her “Kevin”) . Dug is priceless: spot-on for every dog that ever lived, including an obsession with squirrels. Through a series of stop calls and adventures, the quartet vanquishes a villain, saving the day. And Russell earns his scouting badge.
In the process, Carl learns to let go of his shaded mourning for Ellie, and live life again. When this happens, a truly magical thing happens. Before, Carl’s craggy face is gray and monochromatic. At the moment of his transformation, Carl’s face is awash in color, and he is surrounded by elegant hues. It reminded me of The Wizard of Oz, when Dorothy steps out of her gray world and into a candy-colored Munchkinland. Carl, too, enters a whole fresh world.
Up is a deeply emotional film, paunchy of truth. It’s the year’s best film. Collect another triumph for Pixar.
Someday, Pixar is going to do it — they’re going to execute an emotionally uninspiring, lackluster inviting movie. But in the meantime, they’re peaceful putting out savory involving movies like “Up,” which defies the usual kid-movie conventions by starring a crotchety worn man. It’s a charming, fun runt adventure record with flying dogs and balloon-powered houses, but underlying it is a bittersweet exiguous anecdote about loss and treasure.
As a child, the fearful Carl Fredricksen bonded with the oddball Ellie over their shared treasure of adventure, the explorer Charles Muntz, and Paradise Falls. They later married, go into their “clubhouse” together, and lived a long, sadly childless life together. When Ellie died, she had never fulfilled her dream of going to Paradise Falls.
Now crotchety, alone and harassed by a loyal estate developer, Carl (Ed Asner) is finally ordered to a retirement home. But he isn’t going quietly — instead he attaches thousands of balloons to his house and floats it away toward South America. But he accidentally takes an alive to, naive Wilderness Explorer (a thinly-veiled Boy Scout) named Russell (Jordan Nagai) along for the jog. Bad kid was fair trying to derive an “assisting the elderly” badge.
And the jungle flow to Paradise Falls turns out to have some surprising obstacles: a tremendous emulike bird that Russell names Kevin, a talking dog named Dug (”I am jumping on you, bird!”), and a mysterious dilapidated man who lives deep in the heart of the jungle. Turns out the used guy is very familiar to Carl — and to consume Kevin, he’s willing to sacrifice Carl and Russell.
Industry experts were babbling about how “Up” wouldn’t be as current as the previous Pixar movies, because the protagonist is basically a crusty customary coot. Well, shows what they know. It ended up becoming one of those classic movies that somehow appeals to all ages — while the humor and action appeal to children, adults can enjoy Carl’s esteem for his lost wife, and his tiring, realization that he’s clinging to the past.
In fact, the first ten minutes are some of the most heart-tugging, quietly bittersweet scenes I’ve seen in a long time. Without a word, they note all the ups and downs of a realistic marriage — joys, sorrows (Ellie’s inability to have children), growing customary together, and finally loss.
But it’s not a depressing movie by any stretch — in fact, it’s like a childhood fantasy advance to life, complete with a floating house suspended on hundreds of balloons, and biplanes piloted by a talking dog army.. Plenty of spacious dialogue (”Do you want to play a game? It’s called Gaze Who Can Go the Longest Without Saying Anything.” “Cold! My mom loves that game!”) and an action-packed climax in an old-fashioned airship.
Ed Asner is absolutely perfect as ubergrouch Carl — crotchety, grumpy, and definite to fulfill his wife’s lifelong dream, but gradually realizing he’s clinging to the past. Nagai is equally perfect as Carl’s polar opposite: a naive, chattery Scout who is positive to reunite Kevin with her baby chicks. And the utterly adorable Dug and the other dogs deserve special survey. These creatures are utterly hilarious — they talk (”I hid under your porch because I care for you”) and act the contrivance dogs would if they talked. Three words: cone of shame.
The two-disc edition is going to have some very nice extras, but once again people with regular-def DVDs are going to glean shafted because the Blu-ray edition will have a bunch of queer stuff. Grr. As for this one, there’s a digital copy, the director’s audio commentary, kinda-alternate-ending “The Many Endings of Muntz,” and the documentary “Adventure Is Out There” about the research for this movie.
There are also a pair of adorable gripping shorts. “Partly Cloudy” has a much-abused stork having to negate potentially cross baby creatures from a kind but clueless cloud. And “Dug’s Special Mission” is a sort of backstory for the adorable Dug, explaining what the heck he was doing before he met up with Carl and Russell.
“Up” continues Pixar’s running tally of gloriously gripping, emotionally layered movies that the entire family can indulge in. With that, I have only one more thing to say… SQUIRREL!
