UP

Up is a beautiful new movie from Pixar about dreams lost and dreams found. It stars Ed Asner (of ALL people) as the voice of Carl Fredricksen, an retired old man living alone after the death of his wife. He lives in the middle of a construction site, refusing to sell the house he has spent his whole life in since he was married. After some legal troubles and realizing that he has little time left he rigs his house with balloons and sets off to fulfill a promise he made to his late wife to visit some mythical waterfalls in South America. Accompanied on his journey is Russell, an overeager Wilderness Explorer Scout (in Tribe 54). Of course he didn't realize that Russell was an unwitting and unwanted passenger on his journey. The movie is sweet and lyrical with characters rarely seen in any mainstream movie and I appreciated that. Russell has the eager naivety of a child and of course proves to be indispensable when Fredricksen needs the kid's wilderness skill set to survive in the strange new world he has found himself in. There is a story involving a disgraced explorer that has ties to Fredricksen's childhood but that is incidental to the bonding that the childless old man and the fatherless boy go through. Along the way they adopt a huge female bird Russell names Kevin and meet a talking dog named Dug who has a collar that allows him to speak to people (a brilliant way to advance the plot and give voice to a character in a way that would have been out of place in a non 'talking animal' movie). On their trail are three other talking dogs that are after Kevin the bird for their master the explorer. This is a terrific old school adventure. Once again Pixar has invented something totally original and has redefined what it means to be a family. They don't always have to be the group of individuals you are born into. Family can come about by the sharing of life experiences and through love and sacrifice. There is also a not so subtle message about letting go of the things that weigh us down and keep us from fullfilling our dreams. Its a good message that can't be said often enough.