Up (2009)

Seventy-eight year old Carl Fredricksen travels to Paradise Falls in his home equipped with balloons, inadvertently taking a young stowaway.

Directors: Pete Docter, Bob Peterson

Writers: Pete Docter (story by), Bob Peterson (story by)

Stars: Edward Asner, Jordan Nagai, John Ratzenberger

Storyline

Carl Fredrickson is a little boy and a dreamer who idolizes the adventurer Charles Munts. When he meets Ellie, who also worships Munts, they become close friends. However Charles Munts falls into disgrace, accused of forging the skeleton of the monster of Paradise Falls. He travels in his blimp to South America to bring the monster back alive but is never seen again. Eventually Carl grows up and marries Ellie. They promise each other that they would travel together to Paradise Falls and build a house there. Many years later, Ellie dies and Carl, who's lonely, refuses to move from their house despite the offers of the owner of a construction company. When Carl accidentally hits a worker that damaged his mailbox, he is sentenced to move to a retirement home. However, he uses many balloons to float his house in order to travel to Paradise Falls. Adventure ensues.

User Reviews

Pixar hits it out of the park, again

12 May 2009 | by choco_taco (United States)

I was lucky enough to get a ticket to a special pre-release screening of Up at Pixar studios in Emeryville, organized by the San Francisco Film Society. After a hour-long reception in the atrium of their beautiful main building we went through some rigorous security (metal detectors!) and were treated to an hilarious short (Partly Cloudy) and Pixar's new high water mark, Up.

My favorites to date have definitely been Wall-E and the Incredibles, and Up is another slightly-left-of-center masterpiece. The emotional impact of the beautiful, wordless summation of Carl's life that opens the movie is the bass note that resonates through the whole film and is at least as affecting as the scene in Wall-E when he holds his own hands while watching Hello Dolly. The rest of the movie, of course, is breathtaking on just about every level, especially the tactile quality of all the characters and textures and the completely realized weather effects and action scenes. With no "new" technical milestones (fur in Monsters, Inc., water in Finding Nemo, realistic camera effects in Wall- E), the design is the main focus, from the hilariously stylized characters to the amazing setting of the tepui.

As the associate producer who participated in the Q&A following the movie pointed out, the past three Pixar movies have not been easy sells to their parent company Disney (they'll be back in familiar territory with Toy Story 3 and Cars 2), but Pixar's commitment to inventive, story-driven films continues to pay off here. All of the good press is true, and I can't wait to see it again. Thanks for staying true to yourselves Pixar!