Up

First of all, Up is not a movie about a cranky old
coot who, with the help of a roly-poly Boy Scout, finds his inner child
during a series of magical adventures experienced from the front porch
of a dilapidated manse held aloft by hundreds of helium-filled
balloons. Such, of course, is the perception advanced by promotional
materials, which sell short the richness and soulfulness of the latest
Pixar picture, the first American animated offering ever to open le
Festival de Cannes.

That is not to fault the trailer, loaded with pretty pictures and
pratfalls intended to woo the wee ones — like a certain giggly,
giddy five-year-old living in my house for whom the preview was already
“the best movie ever made.” But it doesn’t prepare you for the actual
moviegoing experience, the emotional punch of Up‘s first few
minutes, when it presents the most heartfelt — the most
sincere — love story in recent memory: the love between a
boy and a girl, who become a man and a woman, who become a husband and
a wife, who become a widower and a memory that haunts the rest of what
follows. The first ten minutes of Up are flawless; the final
eighty minutes, close enough. (Though, this note: Do not see Up
in 3-D. It’s inessential to the telling of this deeply felt tale and
altogether distracting.)

The movie begins in a theater, with young Carl Fredricksen, through
aviator goggles, reveling in the black-and-white newsreel adventures of
the thrill-seeking Charles Muntz (voiced by Christopher Plummer), for
whom “Adventure is out there!” Through happenstance, little Carl
(voiced, barely, by Jeremy Leary) soon meets fellow traveler Ellie
(Elie Docter), and, with her, sets out on an adventure that will last
the rest of his life — a journey that includes crushing blows
(Ellie can’t have children) and modest highs (the simple joy of
renovating a decaying house till it becomes a Technicolor dream home).
The would-be world travelers stay at home till Ellie’s final breath,
restless but content just to be with each other — in other words,
Revolutionary Road, but with love. (And with less blabbing.
Grown-up Carl and Ellie communicate each tenderness with little more
than a smile, a frown, a teardrop, a kiss. No words.) Had Up
ended after those first few minutes, that would have been enough for
some; at a recent preview screening, you could hear the adults sniffle.
But behind me, a little girl asked her grandfather with great
apprehension, “Is that the end of the movie?” She clearly hoped
not.

Rest assured, it gets funny — the talking dog voiced by writer
and co-director Bob Peterson transcends the hackneyed convention of
animated films. And it’s thrilling, too, as the third act takes place
almost entirely in the sky, atop the mammoth zeppelin piloted by Muntz,
who, as it turns out, has been in self-exile in South America, where
he’s gone in search of a mythical bird whose existence he’s been trying
to prove for decades at the expense of his sanity. (The movie even
suggests that Muntz, living in a cave with only a pack of dogs as his
company, has murdered other explorers on the hunt to claim his
prize.)

But despite its title, Up is decidedly earthbound: The
elderly Carl (voiced by Ed Asner, though he looks decidedly like a glum
Hal Holbrook) spends almost the entire movie schlepping his house
across the South American landscape his wife had always hoped to visit.
Carl is literally tethered to a memory, an anchor with a garden hose
wrapped around his torso to keep his home from floating away. And he’s
kept company by an accidental intruder: Russell (Jordan Nagai), an even
more awkward version of the youthful Carl.

The two are meant for each other: the husband without a wife, the
son without a father, each in desperate need of companionship and
adventure lest they disappear. They both find comfort in memories most
would consider mundane — sitting on a curb eating ice cream with
a father while counting cars as they pass by, or sitting in a
comfortable chair next to a loved one on a sunny afternoon. Their
motto: “The boring stuff is the stuff I remember the most.” Perhaps
they should have titled this one The Invisibles, if only because
Down doesn’t have quite the same zip.

Perhaps by now, all of this sounds so unbearably sad and undeniably
grown-up, but only because it is. Pixar movies have been moving in this
direction for years — adult animation sprinkled with just enough
shenanigans to entertain the kids while we get our weep on. Consider
the protagonists: adults stuck in the middle and on their way further
down, but trying like hell to claw their way back up. Monsters,
Inc., directed by Up co-director Pete Docter, was about
mid-level drones sick of their jobs; The Incredibles,
superheroes sick of suburban mediocrity; Ratatouille, a rat
escaping the filthy sewer for a five-star kitchen. To that estimable
lot add Carl, who waited till he was alone and at the end of his life
to discover how much living was left to be done.