Up: The Spirit of Adventure

Tomorrow, Pixar's new movie, Up, will be released. I was fortunate enough to win tickets to a free pre-screening through Ain't It Cool News (thanks Capone!), and once again, Pixar has proven that they are one of the best movie studios out there. The story is deceptively simple, but there is so much going on that I actually wanted the movie to be longer to delve into things that were hinted at, but I mentally extrapolated as the movie was playing. The first 10 minutes or so show us the life of Carl Fredricksen; as a boy, his hero was adventurer Charles Muntz, and Carl wanted to be just like Muntz. One day, Carl was walking past a dilapidated house, and heard someone speaking Muntz's catchphrases. It was in that house that he met Ellie, his wife and lifelong best friend. Throughout their lives together, they wanted to go on adventures, but life got in the way of living. In an effort to fulfill their dreams, Carl bought two tickets to South America (it's just like America, only south!), only to have Ellie fall ill. After Ellie died, Carl spent his time avoiding the world that was changing around him and protecting his house (the same one he met Ellie in) from developers.

Eventually, everything came crashing down. After he accidentally smacked someone on the head with his walker (I think this was the first Pixar film to depict blood), a court ordered Carl to move into a retirement community. However, Carl decides that the time has come to have his adventure; he was a balloon salesman at the zoo where Ellie worked, and he took his remaining stock and attached them to his house so that he could take it to Venezuela. But Carl wasn't alone; Russell, a Wilderness Explorer, was scurrying around under Carl's porch in an effort to earn his "Assisting the Elderly" merit badge. The first theme/plotline that I thought would be explored in more depth was Russell's approach to wilderness and adventuring. There were many times during the movie when Russell showed that he has more of a modern outlook on exploring; he had a GPS device, he had never camped outside before, and he was more interested in the results of his efforts (earning merit badges) than the experience of them. I thought that Carl would address this and contrast it to his idea of exploring new places with the bare essentials, but this was left more to our imagination.

In Venezuela, Carl and Russell met Kevin, a large and colorful bird (who is actually female), Dug, a dog outfitted with a color that translates his thoughts into English, and Charles Muntz, Carl and Ellie's childhood hero. When Carl and Ellie were kids, Muntz brought back a skeleton of a bird of Kevin's species, but scientists believed it to be a fake. Vowing not to return to America until he caught a live specimen, Muntz returned to the jungle to make good on his promise. Unfortunately, Muntz's time in isolation (he only had his dogs to keep him company) has twisted him; we aren't sure if he was always like he is in the movie, but the Muntz that Carl and Russell meet is deranged and obsessive. Of all the Pixar villains (that I've seen; I still have not watched Cars), Muntz is one of the most dangerous, matched only by Syndrome from The Incredibles and Hopper from A Bug's Life (maybe Sid from Toy Story belongs in this category because of his relative dangerousness). When Muntz meets Carl and Russell, he welcomes the company and is happy to meet someone who's heard of him, but when Russell reveals that they have found what Muntz is looking for, Muntz turns on them and tries to take Kevin. This was another plotline that I thought would be developed more, but we were left to make our own interpretations; the movie never explicitly states why Muntz was so villainous, but obsession and dementia are strongly hinted at. Various things he says and does show that he has no desire or care besides proving that he was right. My friend who went with me pointed out that he also likely suffered from egomania; the impetus for his quest was being labeled a fraud, and he could not accept that.

So much about this movie was done well; it was very funny, but very dramatic as well. The sequence of Carl and Ellie's life together was done without dialogue, and it was one of the most moving scenes in a movie in the last few years. And the climax with the derrigible was incredibly well done; the stakes were high (as was their position), and the action was exciting. Also, biplanes! Biplanes! Piloted by dogs! Muntz had a canine army, and they were always a delight to watch. Muntz created the translating collars, and Dug was one of Muntz's dogs, but when he met the much nicer Russell, he joined them. Dug cracked me up in the trailers, and he did not disappoint in the movie itself. His lines were absolutely hilarious, as were his mannerisms, like his squirrel obsession.

I don't know how Pixar can keep making such great movies year after year. Not only do they make great movies, the films continuously make tons of money. I really hope that Joss Whedon returns to Pixar one day (he did script doctor work for the first Toy Story).

Up next: Buffy #3...