Best Picture Review #4: Up
There's a cliché that the judges on American Idol love to overuse: "S/he could sing the phone book and it would still be good." Well, I'm going to use a modified version of it at least one more time: The people at Pixar could make a movie about the phone book and it would still be compelling. Up wasn't the first Pixar movie I went into expecting a train wreck - I didn't really think a movie about a fish swimming across the ocean to find his lost son would be that compelling - but once again, I find myself in awe.
If you think about it, every single one of the Pixar films has at least one memorable scene that advances the plot without using a single spoken word, and I think that's what makes their films distinctive. In Up, they have perfected the art. Consider the following scene (it's from the first act, so there's no spoilers here):
That's not even the only important scene to utilize this technique. The adult Ellie has no lines, yet she's an important character all the way to the end.
There's plenty to be said about the words that are spoken as well. The characters that you don't expect to talk are maybe the funniest, and they provide comic relief at all the right times. This device in lesser hands would have been a serious detriment to the overall feel of the movie, but directors Pete Docter and Bob Peterson made sure that the silly elements didn't dominate.
Ultimately, Up is about how one man deals with grief, and while I'm typically skeptical of movies where everything is wrapped up neatly at the end, the storytelling here is so masterful that I don't think viewers should feel cheated. In fact, the inclusion of the stowaway and the relationship he develops with Carl makes it that much more believable, not to mention more relatable. Up is the first animated movie since Beauty and the Beast to be nominated for Best Picture, and the distinction is more than deserved. I can't think of another animated movie that's tried to do so much and succeeded. 5/5
4 comments:
You have to have respect for a scene that can make you want to laugh in one second then in the very next breath, have you holding back tears, and all without a single spoken word. A second dynamic is that the scene is as heavy as you want it to be. A child can disregard the heaviest parts and still be fully engaged in the story, while an adult can feel the full gravity of loosing a spouse, or getting the news that children aren't a possibility.
I think that's another reason I enjoy the Pixar movies so much. They're accessible to anybody, but the level of depth remains uncompromised.
I also felt the same way about the other silent scene toward the end, which I actually believe is the better one. The silence allows the viewer to engage on whatever level s/he chooses, which is what makes it effective.
By the way, the Church would do well to learn this lesson.
/agree to the church statement.
It's too bad that this movie isn't going to get a truly fair shake at THE Oscar, though I'm confident that it'll win a few.
Thanks for pointing all that out, Robert. As usual, you put waaaaay more into watching movies than I do...and to be honest, when we watched this one, we were too busy laughing at how excited Joey got everytime he saw all of the balloons to catch all of that! Up is a good one!
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