Beth and I caught Up this past weekend, and wow. Pixar has hit another one out of the park. Once again they’ve produced a brilliant, fun, original, creative movie unlike anything I’ve ever seen before. And it’s not just the animation (though that does open up possibilities that don’t exist in a live action movie). I’ve been racking my brain, and I really can’t think of a prior story–movie, novel, or comic book–that’s remotely close to Up’s. Where Disney persists in ripping off centuries old fairy tales, and most studios just keep remaking the same 5 or 6 stale plots over and over, Pixar somehow manages to continue creating wildly new tales out of whole cloth.
Up works on so many levels too. It really will please everyone from 9 to 90, and for completely different reasons. Kids will have a rollicking good time, I promise, but so will their parents and grandparents. I don’t know that I’ve ever seen a movie that so effectively managed to weave a kid-friendly popcorn flick around adult themes. This isn’t merely a movie for the young-at-heart, where a senior citizen may enjoy the light-heartedness of a well-done children’s picture like Aladdin. It’s a movie for the old-at-heart who prefer adult stories with deep themes. Despite the improbable physics and cartoon animals, there’s a very serious story here that people too young to vote just aren’t going to notice unless they come back and watch it again in 20 or 30 years.
One small but impressive detail: where many movie previews pretty much spoil the story and all the surprises, Up’s definitely didn’t. As much as you may have heard from previews and posters and reviews, until you’ve actually seen the movie, chances are you only know about 5-10% of what actually happens. I guess that’s the reward for producing movies that are so consistently good. Moviegoers will buy the product without much of a taste first, and they will be rewarded.
I don’t know what they put in the water over at Pixar to keep the talent churning out such great films with such regularity. I keep waiting for a bad one, but even at their worst (Cars) Pixar films are still completely watchable; and at their best (Ratatouille) they’re some of the best movies ever made.
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