{"id":14976,"date":"2009-06-08T09:14:29","date_gmt":"2009-06-08T15:14:29","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/?p=14976"},"modified":"2014-11-10T06:41:22","modified_gmt":"2014-11-10T13:41:22","slug":"thinking-aboutup","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2009\/06\/08\/thinking-aboutup.html","title":{"rendered":"Thinking about Up<\/i>"},"content":{"rendered":"
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I have been (as the title says) thinking about Disney-Pixar’s Up<\/a><\/em>. <\/p>\n

First off, as I said in my Tweet last evening<\/a>, this movie is gorgeous. It’s probably the best — the most realistic <\/em>— animation that Pixar has ever done, while remaining cartoony enough to avoid the Uncanny Valley <\/em>effect (though the lack of nostrils is disturbing). All the details are lovingly crafted, visible not just in the big things, but in the small — the steadily changing status of the balloons over the house, for example, not to mention the way they behave.<\/p>\n

It’s also an intensely and realistically human <\/em>film. The prolog would suit as a (dark) film all on its own, and the fall and eventual rise of Carl Fredricksen (in humanity and life, as well as in attitude and altitude) is deeply moving, perhaps all the more so because you’re expecting it all to be a “kid’s show.” I was reminded over and over again of some of the darker, more conflicted moments of Finding Nemo<\/em> and Incredibles<\/em>, but Up <\/em>is like this almost all the time, as we watch a man driven by tragedy and a lifetime thought wasted act in ways both heroic and petty.<\/p>\n

In some ways, that points out the biggest flaw to the film, where its very grounded nature interacts with whimsy and some clumsy plot directions with results that might be forgiven elsewhere, but here jar all the more.<\/p>\n

(Spoilers below …)<\/em> <\/p>\n

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I’m not talking here about the initial conceit — sending a house off into the air with twenty-odd thousand helium balloons. In some fashion, like with The Wizard of Oz <\/em>(which this film resembles in many ways), I’m willing to overlook that. But some other items stretched the bounds of suspended disbelief.<\/p>\n