It wouldn’t be spring, or summer, without a new Pixar movie and Up is the newest edition to the Pixar family. The trailers for this movie already prove that it will probably fit right at home with talking cars, lovable monsters and a robot with a crush on plants.
Ed Asner lends his voice as Carl Fredrickson, a 78-year old who ties thousands of balloons to his house in order to take a trip to South America and see the sights. In this time of economic strife it may be cheaper to buy and inflate thousands of balloons instead of purchase a plane ticket, but who wants to clean up that mess afterward?
Carl isn’t alone as 8-year old Russell, voiced by new comer Jordan Nagai, stows away in the house to join Carl for the ride of their lives. Nothing says family fun like an old curmudgeon and his funny child-actor sidekick running through a jungle of talking dogs and over-sized tropical birds.
Thankfully, Pixar has found a way to incorporate many kinds of humor into their animated movies. Plenty of verbal and sight gags keep audiences rolling in their seats as the fun barrels on. In the tradition of Disney animated movies, where every summer you’d wait to see what story they would exploit next, Pixar makes animated movies fun to watch again if you’re 8 or 78.
Dreamworks does a solid job, too, but they seem to be trying too hard and sometimes come up short. If Dreamworks pulled out the stops for their animation instead of getting countless actors to voice their movies, then they might be on the same level as Pixar. Until the scale evens out, be sure to set your calendar for May 29 and get ready for an exciting ride.
