Pixar Pint #10: Up

Everyone remembers the first 10 minutes. How's the rest of it?

Welcome back to Pixar Pints, our summer-long journey through all 25 Pixar films in release order.

Did y’all know this film premiered at Cannes? Pretty much every Pixar film prior premiered at a theatre in Los Angeles (usually El Capitan) – Cars is a fun exception, debuting at Charlotte Motor Speedway – but this one? Biggest film festival in the world. It was the first animated film ever to premiere at Cannes. What did festivalgoers watch that day?

Let’s get into it.

Up quick facts

Release date: May 29, 2009 | Director: Pete Docter | Music: Michael Giacchino

Starring: Ed Asner (Carl), Jordan Nagai (Russell), Christopher Plummer (Charles), Bob Peterson (Dug and Alpha)

John Ratzenberger as: Tom, the construction foreman

Budget: $175 million | Box office: $735.1 million

Academy Awards: Won Best Animated Feature and Best Original Score; nominated for Best Picture (lost to The Hurt Locker), Best Original Screenplay, and Best Sound Editing

Eli

Aesthetic: 8/10 | Where Cars is vivid for no good reason, Up is even more vivid for all the right reasons. The bright colors and striking scenery add to the journey's whimsy and make you feel like you're on the adventure of a lifetime. Pixar had their work cut out for them emulating the beauty of the real-life Angel Falls, the actual highest waterfall on Earth, and they aced it. The negative: Russell's character design looks too blobby and the dogs looked a little too uncannily realistic for how cartoony the humans looked. These characters are on screen for most of the runtime and they detract from the rest of the look for me, but all in all, still awesome work.

Animation: 7/10 | You know how Ratatouille made all of the human characters move like absurd caricatures of their obviously cartoon selves? For some reason, Up doesn't do that, and I think it's for the worse. Everyone moves too realistically for how they're designed and it just looks...off. Russell's movements in particular are super stiff. I do wanna praise Pixar's take on clouds for the second straight film: everything here - from the cumulonimbus storm clouds in the beginning, to the fog at the top of Paradise Falls, to the clouds Carl's house sinks into at the end - is done spectacularly.

Story: 9/10 | This isn't meant to be a CinemaSins style plothole nitpick or anything because I generally think those are lazy criticism, but I thought it was funny how the story kicked into motion. The construction team accidentally destroys Carl's private property so he rushes over to prevent any further damage, staying on his private property while fighting with a worker. He whacks the worker in the head in what could reasonably be considered self-defense and the courts side against him? I thought this was America! That non-sequitur aside, the story was great. Russell tries so hard to send Carl on new adventures at Paradise Falls and Carl just keeps dragging himself kicking and screaming away from them until it's almost too late. Charles' arc is a little sloppy but I think overall it accomplishes what it sets out to do, telling viewers that meeting your heroes can often end poorly. Russell's line, "that might sound boring, but I think the boring stuff is the stuff I remember the most" hits so hard in thinking back on past relationships of any kind.

Characters: 9/10 | Ellie is my favorite character because of how she's used after her death. It's a much more subtle version of what Ratatouille did with Gusteau; you can almost hear her replying to Carl in his head every time he talks to her out loud, and reading her words on the last page of the adventure book is what causes him to completely change his tone. It's like she never left him. Carl and Russell are expertly written to fill their roles. Their actions are believable emotionally touching. Even Charles' villain arc makes sense; he's been looking for that bird for literal decades, isolated from humanity, so of course he's gonna go a little crazy when he's so close to what he's been after for so long. My only real issue is that the dog characters feel very Minion-y to me, and that always puts me off (Up predates Despicable Me by about a year, but this style of background characterization was already in vogue by this point).

Acting: 6/10 | Ed Asner's Carl steals the show here. Jordan Nagai's Russell is good. Everyone else is meh except for Bob Peterson's Alpha, who is all over the place and kinda bad.

Music: 10/10 | Michael Giacchino with another masterpiece. The motifs are used and reused here to perfection, and of course, the opening sequence is an A+ tearjerker.

Final score: 8/10 | The first Pixar movie I have no real childhood connection to, as I think this is the first time I've seen it all the way through. I can absolutely see why people only remember it for the first 10 minutes, but the whole thing is worth revisiting.

Leah

Aesthetic: 7/10 | Loved the balloons, paradise falls, the house... Carl and Ellie's space showed off their characters well. I wasn't a huge fan of the character designs in this movie. The dogs were uncanny, the people were shaped oddly... Carl was well done though.

Animation: 7/10 | It was fine. The house and the clouds were visually interesting in their movement. Nothing really stood out to me that much.

Story: 8/10 | To me, this is Pixar's saddest story thus far. Carl is dealing with his grief over losing Ellie. Russell has a troubled home life. It's a satisfying arc, where Carl learns to embrace new adventures in his life and open himself up to others.

Characters: 8/10 | Carl and Russell are fantastic. Kevin and Dug are fun. Charles didn't stand out to me too much as a villain; he was overshadowed by the emotional arc Carl was going through. I didn't care much for the dogs either; their humor was a bit stale.

Acting: 7/10 | Ed Asner did a good job bringing that curmudgeon Carl to life. None of the other performances really stood out to me. Nothing bad, just nothing exceptional.

Music: 9/10 | Really gorgeous score. I appreciated the recurring motif throughout the movie; it was used very well to highlight the emotional impact of different moments.

Final score: 8/10 | Emotional impact is this movie's biggest strength. The beginning made me cry. Carl's arc is what makes this movie special to me. Other aspects of the movie didn't do much to wow me, but his journey really stuck with me, and I can appreciate a good character driven story.

Maddy

Aesthetic: 10/10 | The movie is very pretty. Everything is so colorful and nice. Mwah.

Animation: 7/10 | I know I just raved about the aesthetic but watching this feels kinda dated already? Like, Ratatouille and WALL-E have aged a lot better animation-wise to me while watching this. It’s not bad, but…I dunno.

Characters: 8/10 | Carl and Russell’s dynamic is the standout here. The villian is kinda whatever and Dug is very “kids’ movie animal character”, but watching Carl and Russell grow throughout the movie is great.

Story: 7/10 | Up's first 10 minutes is Pixar’s greatest short film. I really think Pixar should try a silent film because they are masters of telling stories without any words and letting the visuals do the work. The rest of the film is fine and feels super generic to me but it's hard not to feel invested knowing where Carl is coming from and watching his own personal journey alongside Russell. I could watch the first 10 minutes over and over again; it’s honestly amazing.

Acting: 7/10 | Another just-decent voice acting performance that has no major standouts. Rest easy, Ed Asner.

Music: 10/10 | You already know. It's “Married Life”. It’s Michael Giacchino. Mwah! Mwah! Mwah!

Final score: 49/60 or 8/10 | It's a movie carried by its first 10 minutes and that's okay. It's still a solid addition to the Pixar collection and continues the hot streak the studio was on in the late ‘00s. It might rank higher than WALL-E in my rankings but I’d probably watch WALL-E over Up nine times out of 10.

Fun Maddy note: This was the first Pixar movie to receive a nomination for Best Picture at the Oscars.

David

Aesthetic: It's beautiful. Up is incredibly bright, vivacious, and full of energy. It gives the adventure all the more sticking power, and I think the color usage plays nicely throughout the film - Carl in mostly drab tones, Russell in electric oranges, and the scenery shifting from duller tones in the city to intense brightness in the jungle. I adore the way that the characters were designed - it's absurd, and yet it's perfect for this film.

Animation: I think it's fine, if unspectacular. There are some absolutely gorgeous shots managed in the wilderness, when it comes to the clouds and the waterfalls and that scenery, but nailing down human movement still seems to elude Pixar at times.

Story: The opening is a little weird and a little disjointed - it never fully clicks for me why things unfurl as they do, but hey - we get house with balloons, and away we go. After that, it's beautiful. Charles is a fine antagonist, but a little underwhelming. I don't really mind, because I think it gives more weight and more time to the central storyline between Carl and Russell and Carl and himself - and allowing us as much time as possible with that throughout the film is beautiful.

Characters: Carl and Russell are an incredible one-two punch, with Russell dragging Carl time and time again into shenanigans and tomfoolery, much to Carl's chagrin. It's such a sweet dynamic, and getting to see Russell eventually wear Carl down into warming up to the hyper little dude is pretty precious.

Acting: Ed Asner (rest in peace) nailed this one. Outside of that, I don't really remember anyone specific, but I thoroughly enjoyed everyone's portrayals of their characters.

Music: Michael Giacchino did not need to go this hard but he did! “Married Life” makes me tear up every time I hear it!

Final score: 10/10 | It just edges Wall-E out to take the top spot, but these two back-to-back are a PHENOMENAL pairing. I love this movie so much - and even though the first 10 minutes are what tends to (rightfully) get all the fanfare, I can't believe how much of this movie I felt myself falling back into 13 years after it originally came out. As much as I love so many of these films, this is the one that - for me - objectively serves as testament to Pixar's quality as a studio, and puts together an incredibly complete profile in all the aspects we're judging on.

Final notes

Nik was unavailable this week, but we hope he’ll be back for future installments of Pixar Pints.

Next up: Toy Story 3