Print
E-mail
Up ... And Away!
 |
| Edward Asner is the voice of Carl Frederickson, an elderly man in a flying house, in “Up,” the latest digitally animated adventure from Pixar Studios. (Disney/Pixar Animation Studios) |
‘Up,’ Pixar’s Nearly Perfect 10th Film
By JONATHAN L. FISCHER, The Bulletin
When did our serious movies stop being fun?
Or to pivot closer to the point: Why have our entertainments — particularly those for children — become so inconsequential? (I’m looking at you, “Hotel For Dogs.”) It seems the family-friendly landscape has become so dire in recent years that, in this our most ritualistic of seasons, we’ve quietly consecrated a new rite of summer: awaiting, with giddy eyes and baited breath, the latest dollop of insanity from Disney’s Pixar Animation Studios. Rarely have we been disappointed.
It’s hard to say that “Up” is the best or thematically richest film to emerge from that company (those distinctions belong to “The Incredibles,” from 2004, and last year’s “WALL-E”). But it’s a testament to the Pixar pedigree — as well as the current golden age of innovative, story-driven, animated American films — that as exhilarating and nearly perfect as “Up” is, it still doesn’t soar to the heights reached by three or four of its siblings.
And yet soar “Up” does.
Its perfectly mismatched cast — an old curmudgeon named Carl (Edward Asner); a pudgy, well-meaning scout named Russell (Jordan Nagai); Kevin, a large, colorful and decidedly female bird; and Dug (Bob Peterson), a talking dog — flies through the heavens in a house carried by 10,000 balloons. Its villain, the once-great explorer Charles Muntz (Christopher Plummer), bullets after them in a “floating palace in the sky,” a zeppelinlike fortress. And the film itself propels its characters upward while probing inward, telling a heartfelt and, indeed, uplifting story of romantic grief and platonic companionship.
Undoubtedly, escapades — not ideas — are the point here. Yet the film’s intelligence is so potent, you’ll swear the flying house is fueled by brainpower, not lifted by balloons.
At the same time, writer Bob Peterson and his co-director Pete Docter (“Monsters Inc.”) craft a thrilling, old-school adventure with arguably the highest laugh-to-minute ratio of any Pixar film. The humor never condescends to the audience, nor does it trade in the oft-grating pop-awareness of DreamWorks Animation’s oeuvre (think “Shrek” and “Madagascar”). Rather, the twin weapons of “Up” are absurdism and wit.
Make that “triplets.” Nostalgia — for a certain type of buddy comedy, for the Hollywood adventure-film trope — is essential to the success of “Up.” That the film begins in sepia tones — before expanding into the most vivid of palettes — tells us just that.
The place is an unnamed Midwestern city. The time is 60, maybe 65 years ago. And our guide is a small, shy, saucer-eyed boy named Carl, who watches film reels of Muntz’s exploits through a pair of goggles and the rosy tint of imagination. Carl wants to follow in his hero’s footsteps, as does the sprightly firecracker he eventually marries, Ellie; they save coins in a jar so that one day they may venture to Paradise Falls, a South American land-lost-in-time, where Muntz long ago disappeared. But as Carl and Ellie grow old — in a mostly silent montage that’s nearly as poetic as the first 45 minutes of “Wall-E” — the more practical concerns of life repeatedly defer that dream.
Unlike many contemporary works of digital animation, “Up” doesn’t dress up its adult themes as less-than-benign jokes that only grown-ups will understand. Ellie, it is established, is unable to give birth, and by the end of the film’s first 20 minutes, she has died of some unspecified ailment. About to be forced into a retirement home, Carl embarks on the adventure he had hoped to share with Ellie.
How we cherish our dearly departed once the time for mourning has passed is a theme “Up” meditates on heavily. Frequently, Carl looks up at his floating house (where he has lived his entire adult life), sighs and whispers “Ellie”; when it is placed in danger, he screams his wife’s name. Far from moving on, Carl has let his old life carry him even as he sets out on his great adventure.
This is all serious stuff, yet despite the PG rating, I wouldn’t hesitate to recommend “Up” for all ages; the face of every child walking out of a screening last week carried a gauzy smile. Part of that fell on Carl, whose world-weariness masks a prankster of a man. Much credit belongs to klutzy, good-intentioned, even brave Russell, who ends up on Carl’s adventure for reasons I won’t spoil here. There’s the lustrous world Mr. Docter and Mr. Peterson have created, full of canines who speak too literally (“I was hiding under your porch because I love you,” says an eager Dug to Carl); gorgeous, spacious vistas; and the strangest, most effective comic sensibility this side of Judd Apatow (audiences may even forgive the obligatory dogs-playing-poker shot).
As the tale takes a deadlier turn with the emergence of the villainous Muntz, the “Up” adventure only speeds up, with chases, duels and a dogfight (literally) in the skies. Even here “Up” is smart and measured. “The wilderness isn’t quite what I expected,” ponders Russell. “It’s wild.” Amid the journey of his life, Russell muses that we often remember our boring moments most fondly.
That’s Russell’s lesson: Bruise your knees, learn and finally go home. For Carl, who has invested all his hope and despair in a material object, it’s more hard-fought: He must learn to honor Ellie and let go.
Adults (not kids) may be less satisfied with how “Up” wraps up that last theme, at least given the film’s slightly undermining coda. Ultimately, though, such criticisms simply feel nitpicky. “Up” is as perfect as nearly perfect gets.
Jonathan L. Fischer can be reached at jonathanlfischer@gmail.com
Or to pivot closer to the point: Why have our entertainments — particularly those for children — become so inconsequential? (I’m looking at you, “Hotel For Dogs.”) It seems the family-friendly landscape has become so dire in recent years that, in this our most ritualistic of seasons, we’ve quietly consecrated a new rite of summer: awaiting, with giddy eyes and baited breath, the latest dollop of insanity from Disney’s Pixar Animation Studios. Rarely have we been disappointed.
It’s hard to say that “Up” is the best or thematically richest film to emerge from that company (those distinctions belong to “The Incredibles,” from 2004, and last year’s “WALL-E”). But it’s a testament to the Pixar pedigree — as well as the current golden age of innovative, story-driven, animated American films — that as exhilarating and nearly perfect as “Up” is, it still doesn’t soar to the heights reached by three or four of its siblings.
And yet soar “Up” does.
Its perfectly mismatched cast — an old curmudgeon named Carl (Edward Asner); a pudgy, well-meaning scout named Russell (Jordan Nagai); Kevin, a large, colorful and decidedly female bird; and Dug (Bob Peterson), a talking dog — flies through the heavens in a house carried by 10,000 balloons. Its villain, the once-great explorer Charles Muntz (Christopher Plummer), bullets after them in a “floating palace in the sky,” a zeppelinlike fortress. And the film itself propels its characters upward while probing inward, telling a heartfelt and, indeed, uplifting story of romantic grief and platonic companionship.
Undoubtedly, escapades — not ideas — are the point here. Yet the film’s intelligence is so potent, you’ll swear the flying house is fueled by brainpower, not lifted by balloons.
At the same time, writer Bob Peterson and his co-director Pete Docter (“Monsters Inc.”) craft a thrilling, old-school adventure with arguably the highest laugh-to-minute ratio of any Pixar film. The humor never condescends to the audience, nor does it trade in the oft-grating pop-awareness of DreamWorks Animation’s oeuvre (think “Shrek” and “Madagascar”). Rather, the twin weapons of “Up” are absurdism and wit.
Make that “triplets.” Nostalgia — for a certain type of buddy comedy, for the Hollywood adventure-film trope — is essential to the success of “Up.” That the film begins in sepia tones — before expanding into the most vivid of palettes — tells us just that.
The place is an unnamed Midwestern city. The time is 60, maybe 65 years ago. And our guide is a small, shy, saucer-eyed boy named Carl, who watches film reels of Muntz’s exploits through a pair of goggles and the rosy tint of imagination. Carl wants to follow in his hero’s footsteps, as does the sprightly firecracker he eventually marries, Ellie; they save coins in a jar so that one day they may venture to Paradise Falls, a South American land-lost-in-time, where Muntz long ago disappeared. But as Carl and Ellie grow old — in a mostly silent montage that’s nearly as poetic as the first 45 minutes of “Wall-E” — the more practical concerns of life repeatedly defer that dream.
Unlike many contemporary works of digital animation, “Up” doesn’t dress up its adult themes as less-than-benign jokes that only grown-ups will understand. Ellie, it is established, is unable to give birth, and by the end of the film’s first 20 minutes, she has died of some unspecified ailment. About to be forced into a retirement home, Carl embarks on the adventure he had hoped to share with Ellie.
How we cherish our dearly departed once the time for mourning has passed is a theme “Up” meditates on heavily. Frequently, Carl looks up at his floating house (where he has lived his entire adult life), sighs and whispers “Ellie”; when it is placed in danger, he screams his wife’s name. Far from moving on, Carl has let his old life carry him even as he sets out on his great adventure.
This is all serious stuff, yet despite the PG rating, I wouldn’t hesitate to recommend “Up” for all ages; the face of every child walking out of a screening last week carried a gauzy smile. Part of that fell on Carl, whose world-weariness masks a prankster of a man. Much credit belongs to klutzy, good-intentioned, even brave Russell, who ends up on Carl’s adventure for reasons I won’t spoil here. There’s the lustrous world Mr. Docter and Mr. Peterson have created, full of canines who speak too literally (“I was hiding under your porch because I love you,” says an eager Dug to Carl); gorgeous, spacious vistas; and the strangest, most effective comic sensibility this side of Judd Apatow (audiences may even forgive the obligatory dogs-playing-poker shot).
As the tale takes a deadlier turn with the emergence of the villainous Muntz, the “Up” adventure only speeds up, with chases, duels and a dogfight (literally) in the skies. Even here “Up” is smart and measured. “The wilderness isn’t quite what I expected,” ponders Russell. “It’s wild.” Amid the journey of his life, Russell muses that we often remember our boring moments most fondly.
That’s Russell’s lesson: Bruise your knees, learn and finally go home. For Carl, who has invested all his hope and despair in a material object, it’s more hard-fought: He must learn to honor Ellie and let go.
Adults (not kids) may be less satisfied with how “Up” wraps up that last theme, at least given the film’s slightly undermining coda. Ultimately, though, such criticisms simply feel nitpicky. “Up” is as perfect as nearly perfect gets.
Jonathan L. Fischer can be reached at jonathanlfischer@gmail.com
 |
 |
|
| In Over Their Heads In The Game Of Life | The Emperor’s New Show: Exploring Napol©on, Myth And Man |
Reader Comments
The following are comments from the readers. In no way do they represent the view of thebulletin.us.
You must register with a valid email to post comments. Only your Member ID will be posted with the comments.
Registered users sign in here: |
Become a Registered User |
