Up (2009)

Director: Pete Docter
Story: Bob Peterson, Pete Docter, Thomas McCarthy
Cast: Edward Asner, Jordan Nagai, Christopher Plummer
Music: Michael Giacchino
Time: 96 minutes
Bottom-line: Rises up and takes the top place in almost everything. Perfect in every aspect

  Up is the third animated film to be nominated for the Academy Award for Best Picture, and it certainly deserved it. This is perhaps Disney Pixar’s best film yet, perhaps second only to Finding Nemo. Like the 2003 film, Up also manages to win the admiration of all three generations of people. A terrific family entertainer, Up is the story of how an old man struggles to fulfill his wife’s lifelong desire.

Carl Fridricksen, in the 1930s, is a shy young boy, who has a high regard of explorer Charles F. Muntz (Plummer). He meets Ellie, a neighbour, who is also a fan of Muntz. Soon, they get married. As they are not able to have children, they save their money for a trip to Paradise Falls. Ellie wishes to have a house on top of the falls. Despite other necessities, an old Carl (Asner) finally manages to get tickets, but by that time, Ellie becomes ill and passes away. A widowed Carl becomes a recluse. He refuses to sell his house to a construction firm, but when he injures a worker, he is forced to go to an old age home. However, just before leaving, Carl shocks everyone by attaching thousands of helium filled balloons to his house, thereby making his house fly. Having escaped the city, Carl is relieved, when a young wilderness explorer, Russell (Nagai) somehow has climbed onto the flying house. Feeling pity for him, Carl reluctantly admits him into the house. Carl lands the house in South America, close to the falls. He pulls the house everywhere, with the help of a water hose. After few adventures, Carl and Russell meet a flightless bird, whom Russell names Kevin. A dog named Dug also befriends them. Dug has a collar that allows it to speak English. However, what Carl and Russell don’t know is that Dug’s master has sent him to find and capture the bird. Whether or not Carl and Russell save the bird, or whether Dug’s master captures the bird, and importantly, whether or not Carl manages to fulfill his wife wish form the rest of the film.

The bird, Russell, Dug and Carl

The best six-seven minutes of the film, in my view, is from about 7 minutes into the film. It begins from the time a young Carl and Ellie get married. Is shows all the incidents till the death of Ellie, with no dialogues, but with only animation and a melodious background score. After Ellie’s death, the scene smoothly moves to an old and lonely Carl getting up from bed, and how his life has changed after the death of his wife. We see that he has lost interest in life, but is only living to give his wife’s wish. Anyway, the main thing is that Docter has beautifully managed to show the entire life of Ellie and Carl together, in less than seven minutes. In this small time we get to know how close they were, and we also sort of feel sorry for Carl.    

The flying house

The story is excellent. It has a mix of everything: love, adventure and comedy. The vocal work is excellent. To accompany the vocal work, the dialogues are also very good. There are lots of funny dialogues, but on the other hand, there are also some scenes in the beginning (especially in the six-seven minutes I mentioned about) which do not have any dialogue, but can be understood by the viewers. The animation is also brilliant. The facial expressions of all characters, particularly the old Carl, are beautifully shown on screen. The editing is smooth: few scenes travel smoothly from one to another, instead of a sudden change. And the score is also good. In many scenes, the score alone makes the scene interesting. The action sequences are shown well. The scene where Carl, along with his house, and Russell get chased by dogs is exciting to see. The final ‘fight’ -if I can call it that- is also shown well.

One scene of Carl's and Ellie's lives together

Another scene of their lives

There are few chosen points of the story I would like to highlight. First, the relationship between Carl and Ellie. As I said before, in seven minutes we come to know all about how close the two of them were. This sets the base for the story. It is only for Ellie’s last wish that Carl lives with hope. Second, the friendship between Carl and Russell. The story shows the working of a young boy’s mind and an old man’s mind. Russell thinks that there is an easy way for everything; he immediately wants to keep a strange bird as a pet without knowing the consequences it gets them into. Also, he doesn’t really have any interest in wilderness: he only does all the stuff related to it for badges. This is pretty much what we do as well: we do something only for the reward, and not because we like it. Russell also shows determination as the story moves on. He is willing to go through dangers just to save the bird. Carl, on the other hand, knows how the world works. He gets irritated by the childish behaviour of Russell; he doesn’t have any love for the bird or the dog or anyone for that matter. He only wants to get his house on top of the falls, and does anything to do it. By the end of the story, both the characters have changed: Russell becomes more mature, and Carl becomes more loving towards the others.

With this film, Pixar has once again managed to create a blockbuster. Terrific animation, excellent dialogues and lots of comedy and a message of hope and love make Up a masterpiece. There is nothing to hate in this film, and just one watch will make you fall in love with the film. This is one animated film that will go down in history as a classic.

My Rating: 5/5
Rotten Tomatoes rating: 98%