Up
My favorite movie of this year (so far), Pixar continues to amaze with it’s 10th film, Up. On the surface it’s an adventure about 78 year old Carl Fredricksen who sets out to fulfill his lifelong dream of exploring South America after his wife Ellie passes away. It’s actually a very layered film about accepting your life and learning to let go that even reminded me a little bit of my favorite film, It’s A Wonderful Life. The film is beautiful looking as you would expect from Pixar. The score by Michael Giacchino is memorable and affecting. It’s one of the funniest films they have made and it has some surprising tonal shifts as well. What I wasn’t prepared for was what happened about 10 minutes into the film.
During a wordless montage of Carl and Ellie getting married and growing old together I began to well up. Once I got a sense of where it was headed I started to cry uncontrollably. Tears streaming down my face, I completely lost it. (I couldn’t believe it but learned after the film that everyone I was with was doing the same thing!) When the film does take a turn at the halfway mark to focus more on the adventure it can take some adjusting to but once you are onboard, it’s great.
It’s incredible how high they have set the bar for themselves, (only disappointing once with Cars), and I can’t imagine any other studio making a “kids film” with a central character who is old enough to retire, where the biggest celebrity voice is Ed Asner. I am anticpating their next film, Toy Story 3 (due out next year) with a bit of sadness because it means we’ll have to wait another year before we get introduced to another set of characters as memorable as these. Highly highly recommended.
