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Movie Review | 'Up'

The House That Soared

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By Manohla Dargis

May 28, 2009

In its opening stretch the new Pixar movie “Up” flies high, borne aloft by a sense of creative flight and a flawlessly realized love story. Its on-screen and unlikely escape artist is Carl Fredricksen, a widower and former balloon salesman with a square head and a round nose that looks ready for honking. Voiced with appreciable impatience by Ed Asner, Carl isn’t your typical American animated hero. He’s 78, for starters, and the years have taken their toll on his lugubrious body and spirit, both of which seem solidly tethered to the ground. Even the two corners of his mouth point straight down. It’s as if he were sagging into the earth.

Eventually a bouquet of balloons sends Carl and his house soaring into the sky, where they go up, up and away and off to an adventure in South America with a portly child, some talking (and snarling and gourmet-cooking) dogs and an unexpected villain. Though the initial images of flight are wonderfully rendered the house shudders and creaks and splinters and groans as it’s ripped from its foundation by the balloons the movie remains bound by convention, despite even its modest 3-D depth. This has become the Pixar way. Passages of glorious imagination are invariably matched by stock characters and banal story choices, as each new movie becomes another manifestation of the movie-industry divide between art and the bottom line.

In “Up” that divide is evident between the early scenes, which tell Carl’s story with extraordinary tenderness and brilliant narrative economy, and the later scenes of him as a geriatric action hero. The movie opens with the young Carl enthusing over black-and-white newsreel images of his hero, a world-famous aviator and explorer, Charles Muntz (Christopher Plummer). Shortly thereafter, Carl meets Ellie, a plucky, would-be adventurer who, a few edits later, becomes his beloved wife, an adult relationship that the director Pete Docter brilliantly compresses into some four wordless minutes during which the couple dream together, face crushing disappointment and grow happily old side by side. Like the opener of “Wall-E” and the critic’s Proustian reminiscence of childhood in “Ratatouille,” this is filmmaking at its purest.

The absence of words suggests that Mr. Docter and the co-director Bob Peterson, with whom he wrote the screenplay, are looking back to the silent era, as Andrew Stanton did with the Chaplinesque start to “Wall-E.” Even so, partly because “Up” includes a newsreel interlude, its marriage sequence also brings to mind the breakfast table in “Citizen Kane.” In this justly famous (talking) montage, Orson Welles shows the collapse of a marriage over a number of years through a series of images of Kane and his first wife seated across from each other at breakfast, another portrait of a marriage in miniature. As in their finest work, the Pixar filmmakers have created thrilling cinema simply by rifling through its history.

Those thrills begin to peter out after the boy, Russell (Jordan Nagai), inadvertently hitches a ride with Carl, forcing the old man to assume increasingly grandfatherly duties. But before that happens there are glories to savor, notably the scenes of Carl having decided to head off on the kind of adventure Ellie and he always postponed taking to the air. When the multihued balloons burst through the top of his wooden house it’s as if a thousand gloriously unfettered thoughts had bloomed above his similarly squared head. Especially lovely is the image of a little girl jumping in giddy delight as the house rises in front of her large picture window, the sunlight through the balloons daubing her room with bright color.

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‘up’: film review.

Winsome, touching and arguably the funniest Pixar effort ever, the gorgeously rendered, high-flying adventure is a tidy 90-minute distillation of all the signature touches that came before it.

By Michael Rechtshaffen

Michael Rechtshaffen

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Given the inherent three-dimensional quality evident in Pixar’s cutting-edge output, the fact that the studio’s 10th animated film is the first to be presented in digital 3-D wouldn’t seem to be particularly groundbreaking in and of itself.

But what gives Up such a joyously buoyant lift is the refreshingly nongimmicky way in which the process has been incorporated into the big picture — and what a wonderful big picture it is.

The Bottom Line Winsome, touching and arguably the funniest Pixar effort ever, the gorgeously rendered, high-flying adventure is a tidy 90-minute distillation of all the signature touches that came before it.

It’s also the ideal choice to serve as the first animated feature ever to open the Festival de Cannes, considering the way it also pays fond homage to cinema’s past, touching upon the works of Chaplin and Hitchcock, not to mention aspects of It’s a Wonderful Life, The Wizard of Oz and, more recently, About Schmidt .

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What is Up ?

It is a love story. A tragedy. A soaring fantasy, and a surreal animated comedy. A three-hankie weepie and a cliffhanging thriller. A cross-generational odd-couple buddy movie; a story of man and dog. A tale of sharply observed melancholy truths and whimsically unfettered nonsense.

Artistic/Entertainment Value

Moral/spiritual value, age appropriateness, mpaa rating, caveat spectator.

On top of all that, Up opens with a standalone cartoon short ( Partly Cloudy ) and a newsreel, like going to the Saturday double-bill matinee in the old days, when Carl Fredrickson was a shy, wide-eyed lad who idolized dashing celebrity explorer Charles Muntz and dreamed of adventure, but became tongue-tied in the overwhelming presence of the irrepressible, voluble young Ellie, his polar opposite and kindred spirit.

Up opens with an eloquent, economical prologue that is among the most arresting tributes to lifelong love that I have ever seen in any film, let alone a cartoon. Joy, serenity, hope and heartbreak, dreams long cherished and long deferred — a lifetime of indelible memories effortlessly evoked in a few brief minutes.

Now a stumpy, crusty old geezer who lives by himself in a forlorn bungalow glaringly out of place in a neighborhood in the throes of urban upheaval, Carl (Edward Asner) is a widower, but Ellie remains very much a presence in the film. She is still the center of Carl’s world, and their love story is the only story he has.

No, Carl won’t hear of selling his house to the faceless suit who razes and erects worlds around him. He doesn’t want the help of the hopelessly earnest young Wilderness Explorer Russell (Jordan Nagai), doggedly fixated on doing the old man a good turn to earn his missing “Assisting the Elderly” merit badge.

Above all, Carl is contemptuously determined that whatever his future holds, it won’t be the sanitized comfort of the Shady Oaks retirement home. What other animated film has contemplated the anxious stubbornness of the elderly to cling to whatever independence they can for as long as they can, to remain connected to familiar places and things? What other animated film even has a senior citizen for a protagonist? ( Howl’s Moving Castle doesn’t count; Miyazaki’s doddering heroine is really a youth in a grandmother’s body.)

And then things start to unravel, and Carl’s future is no longer in his hands — not without reason, to his guilty shame. You may have seen or known about similar cases from the outside; Up shows us the story from Carl’s inside perspective.

And so we come to the great conceit celebrated in the much-seen trailers. If you’ve seen the trailers, you don’t need me to describe it, and if by some twist you haven’t, why would I rob you of the moment of revelation? It is a sequence of singular magic, and the delight of discovery comes but once.

Suffice to say, Carl precipitously decides to throw caution to the winds and embark on the long-dormant dream he and Ellie shared: to follow in the footsteps of their childhood hero Charles Muntz (Christopher Plummer) and go to South America to see the spectacular Paradise Falls in the “Lost World” of Venezuelan mesa country. Yes, the journey started in that magical moment has a destination; Up is not the aimless, lofty film one might imagine from the trailer.

Yet nothing so far could prepare you for the lunacy that commences once the film reaches the vicinity of Carl’s destination. Somehow, like Dorothy with her cyclone, like Muntz in those old newsreeels, Carl has left the ordinary world behind and landed in a “Lost World” of his boyhood pulp fantasies — a world of lighter-than-air airships and biplane dogfights, of exotic refugees from a Dr. Seuss zoology, of “Wallace & Gromit”–esque dogs who cook, among other things, and even (in a conceit echoing the film version of Michael Crichton’s “Lost World” tale Congo ) communicate in a way that is both goofily human yet hilariously canine.

As wonky as the proceedings get, director Pete Docter ( Monsters, Inc. ) and screenwriter and co-director Bob Peterson ( Finding Nemo ) never entirely lose touch with the ragged human emotions underlying the story. There’s an obvious metaphor in the film itself for the strange blend of realism and zaniness, partly tethered to solid ground, partly twisting in the capricious winds of whimsy.

More fundamentally, Carl’s house, the film’s central metaphor, is the embodiment of his shared life with Ellie, and thereby a symbol of Ellie herself. Up offers a sweeter and less uncanny counterpoint to Gil Kenan’s Monster House , a darker computer-animated tale of a crotchety, reclusive old widower inhabiting a house that’s as much a character as the humans, with a mind of its own. Ellie’s childhood “Adventure Book,” a scrapbook documenting her exploits and aspirations, with its blank pages saved for her hoped-for trip to South America, epitomizes the tension between unrealized dreams and what turns out to be the actual stuff of our lives.

But it goes deeper than that. Not to spoil the emotional and narrative territory, I’ll append some brief final thoughts to the end of the review for readers who have seen the film.

There is also poignancy in Russell the Wilderness Explorer’s back story, and in the simple vignettes in which, ultimately, two broken lives prop one another up. Although not as centrally or violently, Up feels the gulf of grief and betrayal in the wake of the absentee father as acutely as The Spiderwick Chronicles — another family film in which a house is much more than a house.

As powerful as the emotional underpinnings are, the characters experiencing those emotions don’t quite come entirely into their own. They’re somewhat archetypal, not entirely unlike the characters in WALL-E , rather than fully realized, specific individuals, like those of Finding Nemo , The Incredibles and Ratatouille . In part because of this, for all its emotional power, for all that Up gets right, on first viewing I find the overall effect to be poignant and charming rather than enthralling.

Rarefied standards, applicable only to the work of Pixar. The very fact that I came this close to the end of this review without mentioning the studio’s name or comparing it to previous works is a testament to their sustained achievement. There was no need. Only one team in the world is doing work like this.

I did not cry while watching Up , though certainly many will, but I was moved to tears afterward thinking about it. It has become commonplace to say that Pixar makes films as much or more for adults as for children, but this is too facile. Up is a film about life that makes realities of adult and even geriatric experience universally accessible, even to the youngest viewers. Isn’t this among the noblest things a story can do?

Final thoughts (thematic spoilers)

For viewers who have seen the film, some parting thoughts about the symbolic depths of Carl’s house.

As noted above, the house represents both Carl’s shared life with Ellie and Ellie herself, who even in her absence remains the defining fixture of Carl’s life.

At first, the house — Carl’s memories, his mourning, his love for his late wife — is his refuge, his solace in a world that is moving on without him, leaving him behind. Then, in a moment of crisis, the house becomes his escape, his freedom. It buoys him up, elevates him above an intolerable situation.

As time goes on, though, the house starts to become something else: a burden. Baggage. An increasingly torpid, even ridiculous dead weight that he feels obliged to drag laboriously around everywhere he goes.

In the end, it threatens to become something worse: a death trap. It is something Carl must let go. Maybe not all at once — maybe it starts with piecemeal efforts that lighten the load — but in the end the whole thing has to be cut loose.

And then, a paradoxical miracle: Only when he lets it go does it finally take its rightful place in the whole drama of his life. The whole story-arc of the house is an astoundingly fluid metaphor for bereavement, grief, loyalty to departed loved ones, malaise and the threat of morbidity, and finally acceptance and something like peace.

Available on DVD and Blu-ray, Up comes loaded with extras, including commentary by directors Pete Docter and Bob Peterson, a new short with Dug the dog (“Doug’s Secret Mission”), and behind-the-scenes featurettes on story development (“The Many Endings of Muntz”) and the filmmakers’ expedition to Venezuela’s tepui highlands (“Adventure is Out There”).

Blu-ray extras offer tons more: featurettes on several characters (elderly Carl, young explorer Russell, brightly-plumed Kevin, even Carl’s house!), a geography game and more. The Blu-ray set also comes with the movie on standard DVD, so it’s worth getting even if a Blu-ray player is still well in your future.

I have mostly stopped reading movie reviews prior to viewing the movies, except for the reviews you write. Perhaps I just read the wrong reviewers, but I’ve noticed that more and more of them pretty much just give away the entire story and leave no room for surprise. It’s almost as though movie reviewers these days want to make sure that the movie consumer knows exactly what their $9.00 (or whatever it costs in your market) is getting them. It sure doesn’t leave a lot of room for surprise and wonder. This was brought to mind rather strongly in comparing your review of Up with the review published by another Christian venue for the same movie. I read yours before seeing the movie (I skipped the spoiler section on first reading, though your spoilers tend to be more coy than most), and the other review post-viewing. While I appreciated the other critic’s insights into some of the themes, I found the six or seven paragraphs summarizing almost the entire movie to be way to revealing. The review gave away too much. I say this not to pick on the other critic, but to illustrate what I see to be a general trend in movie reviews. I’m not a particularly observant movie watcher. I know little about movie-making technique, and I rarely sit around after viewing to analyze what it was that made the story work. I find reviews helpful to tip me off to things to keep an eye out for that I might otherwise miss, insights that amplify the viewing experience, and of course, whether the movie is one I might want to see. For me, a good review is one that I can read both before and after seeing the film and get something out of each time, while also getting to enjoy the movie itself. So thank you. Your reviews are consistently excellent (even when I have to disagree with your conclusions), and have been instrumental in pushing me to see movies I might not otherwise have seen (e.g. Sophie Scholl: The Final Days ). You don’t give away the story or spoil the movie for me, either. For all these things, I am grateful. Thank you!

I think you should up (no pun intended) your rating to an A+. I saw the movie with my teenage kids and they were moved by the incredible love of the couple. I’ve never seen love expressed so simple and so joyful in a cartoon movie.

Thank you for your “final thoughts” on the real role of the house in Up . There was something about the house’s relationship with Carl I didn’t quite get at the time (possibly because I was holding a 2-year-old on my lap, and the moment of the great house-purging occurred just as he — the 2-year-old — ran out of cherry icee — otherwise, he sat through the entire thing in rapt attention), but your comments on how [ spoiler alert ] the house became a burden to be dragged around and Carl’s piecemeal attempts to rid himself of it before realizing it was a real life-trap made the whole movie click for me. And, for what it’s worth, I was one of the guys who cried in the theater (probably the only time during the movie I was glad we’d seen it in 3‑D … those tinted buddy holly glasses are good for something). Not too many animated movies deal with the unsharable grief of a miscarriage (and certainly none with that degree of economy and emotional precision). But then, I cried in Cars (and every other Pixar movie), too, when Route 66 gets bypassed and Radiator Springs becomes a forgotten ghost town, so maybe I’m just a sucker for a good story.

Up was a joy. Your review not only encouraged us to go see it, it magnified our pleasure with the qualities and values it presented. Thanks for your site. You’re a gifted educator.

Thank you for your interesting review of Up . I thought the film was “cute”, but I was personally disappointed after all the hype. Something bothered me (besides the repetitive soundtrack): there were a lot of violent elements in the film (life-threatening situations for the heroes). I understand this is a cartoon, but at the same time, this is not a film with talking cars, superheroes, animated toys, or talking animals (well … okay). We have a character who tries to kill the young Wilderness Explorer not once, not twice but three times (the last time with a shotgun!). When the crazy guy falls to his death, there is no reaction from our “heroes” (not even shock or horror) — their only concern is for the house (and for the weird bird). This situation kinda felt odd in a film geared to young kids.

What are you opinions on the character of Kevin as a gay/transgendered character (colorful, rainbow-like character)? I’ve read that this was a subtle nod by Pixar to the Prop 8/GLBT crowd. I saw the movie and didn’t pick up on it, but others who have seen it had commented on this. I am interested to hear your opinion on this.

I’ve read a lot of reviews of Up , but I don’t think I have heard anyone addressing this particular issue [ spoiler warning ]. When Carl lifts up his house for his trip to Central America, he severs his home’s plumbing and electricity. He makes it clear that he doesn’t have any more balloons or helium. He can’t go back. He only has the food he keeps in the house, and he doesn’t know if he’ll be able to find more edibles in the jungle (and he certainly isn’t prepared to hunt). If he has a medical emergency, there is no doctor or hospital for maybe hundreds of miles. That leads to one conclusion: Carl is going to South America to die. Carl is clearly really healthy for his age (evidenced by all the physical activity he performs), but if he did succeed in moving his house to the cliffs, he would probably only have a few weeks before he died, probably of starvation. This journey is not just an adventure, it’s a suicide mission. I think that the heart of the story lies in Russell (and also Doug’s) ability to make Carl come alive once more. Once Carl realizes that he has a responsibility to others besides himself, Carl realizes that he has to fight to stay alive. I would like to make some comments on your final thoughts on the great metaphor that is Carl’s house. I think that in making the journey, Carl is trying to write the last chapter of his life, and the love story between himself and Ellie. By ripping it from the ground and disconnecting all pipes and wires, he has deliberately rendered it impossible to live in for very long. He has tried to draw the curtain on his life, but Russell and Doug draw it back again, and for the first time since Ellie’s death, Carl has someone to live for — thank goodness.

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The Movie Review: 'Up'

Give the folks at Pixar this (and, while you do, give them anything else they want too): They appreciate the cinematic virtue of showing over telling. The studio has produced quite a few sharp, wordless shorts over the years, and the nearly mute opening act of last year's Wall-E was utterly sublime. Up , the studio's latest marvel, continues the trend with an early four-minute musical montage that encapsulates 50 years of two lives lived together, and lived to the end. It's a heartwarming, heartbreaking sequence: If there's been a more moving scene in a film so far this year, I can't recall it.

The lives in question are those of Carl and Ellie Fredricksen, childhood chums and co-adventurers, teenage sweethearts, and loving husband and wife for half a century. By the time the music stops, though, Ellie has passed away, and Carl, the shy, quiet boy whom she had pumped full of life all those years, deflates into a bitter, lonely old man. If Wall-E opened with the vision of a planet burnt out, Up opens more intimately but no less powerfully with the image of a life burnt out.

Written and directed by Pixar regular Pete Docter (with the aid of co-writer/co-director Bob Peterson), Up is a fascinating hybrid. The studio's previous films have typically targeted young and old alike by choosing subjects of intergenerational appeal (robots, superheroes) or melding disparate elements (a rat with culinary aspirations). But Up is something new, a kid's adventure yarn embedded in a grownup tale about grief and regret, purposes lost and rediscovered.

With his wife gone and commercial developments sprouting like iron weeds on all sides of his trim little Victorian home, Carl (a character inspired in part by Spencer Tracy and Walter Matthau, and voiced with gruff affability by Ed Asner) is literally besieged. After he half-accidentally bloodies a construction worker with his cane (yes, there is actual blood which, though understated, provides a mild shock), he is court-ordered into a retirement home. The orderlies who come by to pick him up, however, ought to have paid a bit more attention to the empty helium bottles littering the front yard: Carl has decided to escape in the only direction he can. (Hence the movie's title.) Several thousand brightly colored balloons later, he is aloft, a deliberate Dorothy steering his house into the blue yonder.

His destination is Paradise Falls, South America, a "land out of time" that he and Ellie had long pledged to visit in emulation of their childhood idol, celebrity explorer Charles Muntz (Christopher Plummer). In classic tradition, Carl bears with him an unintentional stowaway, eight-year-old scout Russell (Jordan Nagai), and when he reaches his destination, he encounters an array of talking dogs and prehistoric flightless birds, as well as another old traveler whose own curdled dreams and unkept promises have left him more embittered still.

In contrast to the near-photorealism of Wall-E 's first half, Docter and production designer Ricky Nierva steer clear of the " uncanny valley " by opting for what they call "simplexity," with characters assembled from basic shapes, like children's toys. Carl is literally (as well as figuratively) as square as a Playmobile retiree, and Russell shares not only the oblong shape but also the innocent tenacity of a Weeble. Working with such simple elements, the filmmakers nonetheless manage to construct images of unanticipated beauty: the balloons that tug gently skyward like an inverted bunch of Technicolor grapes; the faded but still vivid portraits discovered in an old photo album. For those who see the film in 3-D, Pixar's technical folks have done a nearly seamless job, and Docter et al. have the decency to forsake throwing things at the audience every ten minutes. On the aural side, the proceedings are nudged along by a gorgeous waltz from composer Michael Giacchino that is by turns bouncing, wistful, weepy, and exuberant.

Up is not without flaws. Carl and Russell's equatorial odyssey at times settles for cliche, and there may be one or two too many aerial cliffhangers during the climax. But such concerns barely rise to the level of quibble. Up is once again cause to ransack the cupboard in search of any superlative that has not already been cast Pixar's way. It may not be the studio's most ambitious film, but it is perhaps its most touching.

Though the quest to find a lost loved one is a common theme in the Pixar oeuvre, in this case it is abstracted a level. What Carl hopes to recover is not Ellie herself, but rather what she embodied for him: the consolation of family, hope for the future, a reason to go on. I trust I am not giving away too much by reporting that, in the end, he finds all three.

This post originally appeared at TNR.com.

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Metacritic reviews

100 The Hollywood Reporter Michael Rechtshaffen The Hollywood Reporter Michael Rechtshaffen Winsome, touching and arguably the funniest Pixar effort ever, the gorgeously rendered, high-flying adventure is a tidy 90-minute distillation of all the signature touches that came before it.
100 Variety Todd McCarthy Variety Todd McCarthy A captivating odd-couple adventure that becomes funnier and more exciting as it flies along.
100 Village Voice Village Voice The first 10 minutes of Up are flawless; the final 80 minutes, close enough. (Though, note this: Do not see Up in 3-D. It's inessential to the tale and altogether distracting.)
100 Entertainment Weekly Lisa Schwarzbaum Entertainment Weekly Lisa Schwarzbaum A lovely, thoughtful, and yes, uplifting adventure.
100 Time Richard Corliss Time Richard Corliss Extending the patented Pixar mix of humor and heart, Up is the studio's most deeply emotional and affecting work.
100 Chicago Sun-Times Roger Ebert Chicago Sun-Times Roger Ebert This is another masterwork from Pixar, which is leading the charge in modern animation.
90 New York Magazine (Vulture) David Edelstein New York Magazine (Vulture) David Edelstein By all means, see Up in its 3-D incarnation: The cliff drops are vertiginous, and the scores of balloons--bunched into the shape of one giant balloon--are as pluckable as grapes.
90 L.A. Weekly Scott Foundas L.A. Weekly Scott Foundas Up emerges as a gentle hymn to adventure of both the soaring, storybook variety and the smaller, less obvious kind -- the perilous, unpredictable and richly rewarding journey of ordinary, everyday life.
89 Austin Chronicle Marjorie Baumgarten Austin Chronicle Marjorie Baumgarten We will be comparing Up with classics like "The Wizard of Oz" for years to come.
75 ReelViews James Berardinelli ReelViews James Berardinelli Up is not as transcendent as last year's "WALL-E," and doesn't rank near the top of Pixar's pantheon of great features, but it's a solid (and in some ways innovative) fantasy adventure that mixes comedy, action, and drama into a satisfying whole.
See all 37 reviews on Metacritic.com
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Directed by Pete Docter

The greatest adventure is just getting back home.

Carl Fredricksen spent his entire life dreaming of exploring the globe and experiencing life to its fullest. But at age 78, life seems to have passed him by, until a twist of fate (and a persistent 8-year old Wilderness Explorer named Russell) gives him a new lease on life.

Ed Asner Christopher Plummer Jordan Nagai Bob Peterson Delroy Lindo Jerome Ranft John Ratzenberger David Kaye Elie Docter Jeremy Leary Mickie McGowan Danny Mann Donald Fullilove Jess Harnell Josh Cooley Pete Docter Mark Andrews Bob Bergen Brenda Chapman Emma Coats John Cygan Paul Eiding Tony Fucile Teresa Ganzel Sherry Lynn Laraine Newman Teddy Newton Jeff Pidgeon Valerie LaPointe Show All… Jan Rabson Bob Scott

Director Director

Pete Docter

Co-Director Co-Director

Bob Peterson

Producers Producers

Jonas Rivera Denise Ream Mark Nielsen

Writers Writers

Bob Peterson Pete Docter

Story Story

Pete Docter Bob Peterson Tom McCarthy

Casting Casting

Kevin Reher Natalie Lyon

Editors Editors

Kevin Nolting Katherine Ringgold

Cinematography Cinematography

Jean-Claude Kalache Patrick Lin

Additional Directing Add. Directing

Shawn Krause Dave Mullins Michael Venturini

Executive Producers Exec. Producers

Andrew Stanton John Lasseter

Lighting Lighting

Lou Romano Ralph Eggleston Harley Jessup

Camera Operators Camera Operators

Mark Dinicola Jeff Wan

Production Design Production Design

Ricky Nierva

Art Direction Art Direction

Daniel Lopez Muñoz

Visual Effects Visual Effects

Bob Whitehill Jaclyn Simon Russell J. Stough Kyle Ranson-Walsh Yoshi DeHerrera

Title Design Title Design

Susan Bradley

Composer Composer

Michael Giacchino

Sound Sound

Michael Semanick Tom Myers Al Nelson Teresa Eckton J.R. Grubbs Michael Silvers Dan Wallin Pascal Garneau Jonathan Null Frank Rinella Dennie Thorpe Jana Vance Ronald G. Roumas Clint Smith

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Theatrical PG
Theatrical 6

Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela

Theatrical L
Digital 12+
Theatrical 7
Theatrical K-7
Premiere Cannes Film Festival
Theatrical 0
Theatrical K
Theatrical I
Theatrical KN
Theatrical G
Premiere Venice Film Festival
Premiere Tokyo International Film Festival
Digital PG12
Theatrical AA

Netherlands

Premiere Amsterdam
Physical 6 DVD, Blu ray
TV 6 SBS 6

New Zealand

Philippines.

Theatrical M/6
Theatrical AP

Russian Federation

South africa, south korea.

Theatrical ALL
Theatrical Re-release
Physical 7 DVD, Blu-ray
Physical 7 3D Blu-ray

Switzerland

Syrian arab republic.

Theatrical 普遍級
Theatrical U
Premiere Hollywood, California
Physical PG

United Arab Emirates

96 mins More at IMDb TMDb Report this page

Popular reviews

Review by Houston Coley 🌪️ ★★★★★ 148

My family went to see Up on my grandpa’s 70th birthday back in 2009. When the movie was over, I remember everyone being ecstatic - and undeniably moved. At age 9, I think it was probably the first time I’d seen my parents shed tears in a movie. My dad immediately dubbed the first 15 minutes of the film “The Robot Test” - because “if you don’t cry in the first 15 minutes, you’re a robot.”

My grandpa, Jim, loved Up more than anyone else. As soon as he’d seen it once, he wanted to see it again. Happy to do so, we all went back to the theater for the second time that day. A few weeks later, my…

Review by Jeremy Bronson ★★★★★ 15

One hundred years from now, film scholars will study the 15 wordless minutes near the beginning of this movie as one of the finest examples of storytelling across any medium or genre. I say this without threat of hyperbole.

Review by DirkH ★★★★★ 103

Dad what's wrong?

Grown up stuff, sweetheart.

Daddy's just a bit afraid for the world.

Is it because of the Orange Hamster Man?

Are you sad?

Wanna watch a movie?

My kids know me so well.

Review by Josh Larsen ★★★★ 8

Your kids have to see you cry sometime.

Review by cinéfila... 🕯️ ★★★★★

the first ten minutes are great for introducing children to the concept of sadness

Review by James (Schaffrillas) ★★★½ 14

Cute kiddie fluff with an excellent opening and score. Take those out and ehhhhh. Don't get me wrong, Dug is really funny and it's a nice little adventure but it's not really thematically cohesive like Wall-E or Shrek 2. If people could stop calling this the greatest Pixar movie based off of the opening alone that'd be great.

Review by Kait ★★★★ 2

now I’m just imagining me in my eighties finally meeting my childhood idol, paris hilton, and her trying to kill me on top of a plane backed by her army of chihuahuas

Review by alor ★★★½ 6

The 4 minute long montage of Ellie and Carl just being the cutest couple ever completely destroyed me

Review by meg✨ ★★★★★

One of the best film scores in history and if you disagree, you are wrong.

Review by anya jane ★★★★

isle of dogs

Review by Matt Singer ★★★★★ 2

This movie is so perfect it feels like a work of alchemy. The only way I can conceive of someone creating something this moving and funny and exciting is if they first went down to the crossroads and made a deal with Satan. I waffle on Pixar's greatest masterpiece (FINDING NEMO and MONSTERS INC. are usually my other contenders) but for now, I'm going with UP.

Review by liv🦢💌 ★★★★

“I would like to award you the highest honor I can bestow, the Ellie Badge.”

i want to die x

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Up, up, and away, common sense media reviewers.

Disney superhero TV movie has heart but lacks style.

A Lot or a Little?

What you will—and won't—find in this movie.

The purpose of the movie is to entertain rather th

Clear and consistent message that you don't need s

The Marshall family are supportive and loving. Sco

Mild peril but no harm comes to any characters. Ch

Educational Value

The purpose of the movie is to entertain rather than educate.

Positive Messages

Clear and consistent message that you don't need superpowers to be a hero -- even ordinary people can achieve great things. The underlying storyline inspires thinking about the environment and protecting the planet.

Positive Role Models

The Marshall family are supportive and loving. Scott and his friends work together as a team. At first Scott lies to his family, but ultimately sees the importance of honesty. Positive representation: The Marshalls are a Black American family.

Violence & Scariness

Mild peril but no harm comes to any characters. Characters have guns but don't shoot them. A building gets blown up with characters trapped inside -- they escape unharmed. The superheroes are tied up to have their minds wiped.

Did you know you can flag iffy content? Adjust limits for Violence & Scariness in your kid's entertainment guide.

Parents Need to Know

Parents need to know that Up, Up, and Away is a Disney comedy about a family of superheroes. It has many hallmarks of a TV movie -- most notably the laughable special effects -- and subsequently might not hold the attention of media-savvy kids in the 2020s. Despite this, there is a good solid message -- we're all heroes in our own way -- that runs throughout. While there is no real violence, there are sinister characters and perilous moments. Guns are seen but not used, and a building explodes with people inside -- although none come to any harm. It's also quite stressful watching Scott ( Michael J. Pagan ) lie to his parents and put himself in danger by pretending that he has superpowers when he hasn't. Overall, with positive messages and likable kids, it's a passable comedy adventure -- but high-quality viewing it's not. To stay in the loop on more movies like this, you can sign up for weekly Family Movie Night emails .

Where to Watch

Videos and photos.

Community Reviews

Parents say

There aren't any parent reviews yet. Be the first to review this title.

What's the Story?

UP, UP, AND AWAY finds a family of superheroes -- the Marshalls -- living unnoticed in a regular neighborhood. Middle child Scott ( Michael J. Pagan ) is about to turn 14 -- the age at which his superpowers may (or may not) manifest. As his birthday nears, Scott begins to panic, pretending to his family that he has super strength and can fly. Meanwhile a peculiar organization called Earth Protectors is brainwashing Scott's schoolmates -- apparently to make them more environmentally aware but in reality to control their minds for more sinister reasons. When Earth Protectors' evil plans come to light, it's up to Scott to save the day -- and his family.

Is It Any Good?

With naff special effects, laughable costume changes, and some bizarre storylines, this movie is easy to poke fun at. But the overarching message in Up, Up, and Away -- that you don't need superpowers to be a hero -- and some genuinely funny moments make it just about watchable. There is well-placed humor around Scott's (Pagan) mom and dad juggling their day jobs with parenting, marriage, and being superheroes.

The concept of kids being brainwashed by staring mindlessly at their computer screens also strikes an amusing chord. Scott's best buddy, the cool but nerdy Randy ( Chris Marquette ), gets all the best lines, as the friends use seventh grade ingenuity and slapstick to overcome the baddies. Despite being made 20 years ago Up , Up, and Away has aged surprisingly well. And while the clunky, low-grade special effects and various implausible plotlines make it hard to take seriously, this is nevertheless gentle family entertainment with a good heart.

Talk to Your Kids About ...

Families can talk about the positive messages in Up, Up, and Away . Why is honesty and taking responsibility for your actions so important? How did it make you feel when Scott felt he had to lie to his family?

Talk about the differences between made-for-TV movies and theatrical releases. The budgets are much smaller -- what does this mean for the production?

Discuss how environmental awareness has developed in the 20 years since the movie was made. For example, the phrase "single-use plastic" didn't exist in 2000 -- what else has changed?

Why is it important for superheroes to be diverse? How are the Marshall family an example of both racial and gender diversity compared to other superhero films?

Movie Details

On DVD or streaming : January 22, 2000
Cast : Robert Townsend , Michael J Pagan , Alex Datcher
Director : Robert Townsend
Inclusion Information : Black directors, Black actors
Studio : Disney Channel Original Movies
Genre : Comedy
Topics : Superheroes
Run time : 77 minutes
MPAA rating : NR
Last updated : February 18, 2023

Did we miss something on diversity?

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Movie Review Archives

Movie Review: Up (2009)

General Disdain
Movie Reviews
3 responses
--> June 8, 2009

Admit it, you’re just like me — you really had no idea what Disney Pixar’s latest animated adventure, Up was about. For me, all I knew was it had a grumpy old man, a fat kid, a talking dog and a colorful bird in it. Oh yeah, how could I forget, there was also a house, a house that was being whisked about the sky by a million balloons. How all these pieces were supposed connect to form a cohesive story was going to take a lot of effort to pull off.

Yet ain’t it something — they pulled it off. Incredibly well too, I might add. And yep, I’m stunned about it; I certainly thought Up was going to be the Pixar clunker we’ve all been awaiting for some time. Instead, this film may be their strongest showing yet.

Continuing through the door that WALL-E ripped open, Up too, tells a powerful tale without wasting words or packing the 96 minute running time with unneeded filler material.

It gets going with an unexpectedly moving and heartfelt montage laying out the younger years of Carl Fredericksen (voiced by Edward Asner). He meets Ellie, a girl who shares his passion to become a great explorer like the famed Charles Muntz (voiced by Christopher Plummer). They marry and build a fulfilling life together. She dies without them ever visiting their dream location, Paradise Falls or having children. Full of loneliness and sorrow, and backed into a corner, Carl gives the proverbial finger to the fast moving society building up around him by, quite literally, taking his house up and away. To Paradise Falls, South America he goes, as a final tribute to the woman he loved so much.

The ensuing adventure itself isn’t one to write home to mommy about — at its base it is simply a flighty fight for a colorful dodo-like bird between Charles Muntz with his army of talking dogs and Carl Fredericksen aided by a Junior Wilderness Explorer named Russell (voiced by Jordan Nagai). It’s fun to watch due in part to its child-infused absurdity (dogs flying planes?) but mostly because it is fantastically modeled and rendered, and because the slow transformation of Mr. Fredericksen from old codger to an old man with a new lease on life is handled better than most live-acted dramas.

The animation is, as expected, a no-brainer; Pixar has pushed the limits of computer generated realism for years. Up doesn’t noticeably break any new ground (of course I didn’t see the 3D version of the film, so I may very well be wrong here) but it doesn’t lose any either. I’ll just say the landscapes and vistas are beautifully put together. What I found particularly engrossing, which leads to my transformative point, was the small details in Fredericksen’s face and the way he carried himself. In the beginning he was forlorn and lost, and by the end he’s engaged and reinvigorated — with so much of the story being told without ever needing a word spoken. Pete Docter, the man ultimately responsible for this project, had really seen to it that Carl could give the best silent film actors a run for their money for best conveying of a story via expressions only. Ben Affleck, take notes.

Oh yeah, the music score by Michael Giacchino is damn good too. So good in fact, I wouldn’t doubt it gets an award or two.

With Up , Pixar is clearly showing how far they’ve matured. It’s not just about the cutesy characters anymore (although they’re thrown in for good measure), it’s more about the substance of the story and the manner in which it is told. The bar has been raised, DreamWorks Animation — and this is one tough act to follow.

I'm an old, miserable fart set in his ways. Some of the things that bring a smile to my face are (in no particular order): Teenage back acne, the rain on my face, long walks on the beach and redneck women named Francis. Oh yeah, I like to watch and criticize movies.

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'Movie Review: Up (2009)' have 3 comments

June 11, 2009 @ 9:43 am hanna

I admit as you, i did not know anything about Up when i went and saw it,I had not even seen the commercial! I was pleasently suprised after i saw the movie. I loved it!

April 30, 2010 @ 3:50 am IBS

This is a really good review. I havent actually seen Up yet, but it sounds like a great fun movie. I wasnt a big fan of WALL-E so I hope this is better.

May 1, 2010 @ 8:44 pm Richmond

Great movie that gives the viewer a mix of emotions.

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Up Parent Guide

Marrying fantastical premises with charming, believable characters, this aerostat adventure is a definite thumbs "up" experience for everyone from older children to senior citizens..

Seventy-eight-year-old Carl Fredricksen (voice of Edward Asner) has always wanted to see South America, so he ties thousands of balloons to his house and heads UP and away on the adventure of a lifetime. All seems to be going according to plan until the elderly man discovers some excess baggage, in the form of a pesky nine-year-old named Russell (voice of Jordan Nagai), who has inadvertently come along for the ride.

Release date May 29, 2009

Run Time: 96 minutes

Official Movie Site

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The guide to our grades, parent movie review by kerry bennett.

When a studio is as consistently successful as Pixar has been, audiences almost hold their breath in anticipation of a misstep. Thankfully, we can all inhale deeply. Honored as the first animation and first 3D film to open the Cannes Film Festival, Up celebrates the elderly in much the same way The Incredibles validates those who are experiencing middle age.

Still, despite the company’s track record for family friendly fare, don’t expect this film to be suitable for all ages. Several intense scenes, including one in which a man sustains a bloody injury after being hit over the head with a cane and the portrayal of a house fire, are likely too frightening for young or sensitive viewers.

However, while hovering high above the countryside, Carl discovers a stowaway on his front porch. Russell (voiced by Jordan Nagai) is an earnest but woefully inexperienced Wilderness Explorer who was hunting for snipes under the house when the building became airborne. Pleading to be let in, Russell joins the ill-humored old man on his high-flying voyage.

As with life, the fun of this film is all about the journey rather that arriving at the destination. Meeting up with a mutt named Dug (voiced by Bob Peterson) who can literally speak and a richly plumaged bird named Kevin, Carl and Russell also tangle with three imposing canines, Alpha (also voiced by Bob Peterson), Beta (voiced by Delroy Lindo) and Gamma (voiced by Jerome Ranft).

Pixar’s attention to the most minuscule of details, like dust particles wafting through an abandoned house and the thickening stubble on an old man’s face, give visual depth and reality to this 3D experience. Meanwhile, a strong storyline that is equally funny, tender, poignant and hopeful propels Up far beyond the realms of a mere children’s cartoon. The jokes are based not so much on slapstick as they are the funny realities of life, like those experienced by any parent and child on a long road trip.

Marrying fantastical premises with charming, believable characters, this aerostat adventure is a definite thumbs Up experience for everyone from older children to senior citizens.

About author

Kerry Bennett

Up rating & content info.

Why is Up rated PG? Up is rated PG by the MPAA for some peril and action.

While this animated film contains a strong storyline and well-timed humor, there are several scenes of intense peril and some violence that may disturb younger viewers. An old man hits another man over the head with his cane. The result is a bloody head injury. An animal bleeds after being bitten on the leg. A child falls from a second story in an old house resulting in a broken arm. A character admits to tearing a picture out of a library book. A sad young couple is shown in a doctor’s office after learning they cannot have a child. An elderly character experiences loneliness after the illness and death of a loved one. Travelers experience the tumult of thunder and rainstorms. On several occasions, dogs chase humans or other animals. Animals fall over a cliff into a river below. A dog bites a man. Two men fight using a sword, cane and other items. Moments of peril are shown when a house is started on fire, pilots in fighter planes shoot darts at a child before crashing and an animal is captured in a net. Later, characters are shown crawling along the top of a blimp. A character falls from the blimp with death implied. A character makes comments about using the bathroom in the wilderness. Dogs serve champagne to two human adults.

In Up ‘s opening short, Partly Cloudy , storks are shown delivering babies of both the human and animal type. One stork has his head bitten by a baby alligator , is bunted by a baby mountain goat and impaled by a baby porcupine. Later he is shocked by an electric eel.

Page last updated July 25, 2016

Up Parents' Guide

What does Carl have to get rid of in order to be the hero in this film? How can possessions, past grievances or other issues keep people from progressing or fully enjoying life? What positive things come out of his relationship with Russell?

To get the eager Wilderness Explorer to quit bothering him, Carl sends Russell on a snipe hunt. For anyone who hasn’t gone to camp or experienced this activity, you can learn more at this Wikipedia article .

Having lost our family pet in the recent past, I wonder what our dog would have said if he had been given a voice. Would you want to be able to have your pet "speak" or is it better to have the benefit of a more silent companion?

The most recent home video release of Up movie is December 3, 2012. Here are some details…

Home Video Notes: Up (3D)

Release Date: 4 December 2012

Disney Studios re-releases Up to home video in a 3D version. The 5 Disc package includes a Blu-ray 3D, Blu-ray, DVD and Digital Copy of the movie.

Release Date: 10 November 2009

Up soars onto DVD in an anamorphic (enhanced for widescreen TVs) presentation, with audio tracks in Dolby Digital 5.1 (English, Spanish and French). Other bonus materials include:

- Commentary by director Pete Docter and co-director Bob Peterson.

- Short Films: Dug’s Special Mission and Partly Cloudy .

- Alternate endings: The Many Endings of Muntz

- Documentary: Adventure is Out There

Up: 2-Disc Deluxe Edition DVD and Digital Copy offers all of the extra features of the DVD version of Up, plus a digital copy of the movie.

Up on Blu-ray, with a DVD and Digital Copy is presented in widescreen (in1080p HD resolution), with audio tracks in DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 (English). Bonus materials include:

- Cine-Explore (concept art, clips and documentary coverage that illustrates the directors’ commentary).

- Character Studies: Geriatric Hero, Canine Companions , Russell: Wilderness Explorer , Our Giant Flightless Friend, Kevin , Homemakers of Pixar .

- Featurettes: Balloons and Flight , Composing for Characters and Married Life .

- Game: Global Guardian Badge Game (a geography game enhanced by BD-Live).

- DVD copy of Up.

- Digital Copy of Up.

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10 Wes Craven Movies You Probably Haven't Seen

Seven years ago, star wars secretly introduced a subtle new lightsaber type that raises massive questions about the jedi, the upcoming rocky movie i'm most excited about isn't creed 4.

There's nothing better than an easy review: Pixar's latest summer offering, UP , is a fantastic film. Simply fantastic. Seriously, if Ratatouille and Wall-E deserved to be in the running for Best Picture of the Year (as many said they did at the times of their releases) then UP certainly does.

It's that good.

The film - which was written by Bob Peterson ( Finding Nemo , Ratatouille ) and directed by Peter Docter ( Monsters, Inc. ) - delivers all the things we've come to expect from a Pixar animated feature: gorgeous visuals, a strong story rife with moral lessons and (gasp) good character development; humor both low-brow (for the kids) and high-brow (for the grownups), with strokes of bold wit and a dash of sagely wisdom for good measure.

And yet, UP also delivers something quite unexpected: Pixar's most adult-oriented story yet, slyly disguised in a fantastic adventure tale.

UP tells the life story of Carl Fredricksen (the unmistakable voice of Ed Asner), a shy little boy who grows up in (1930s?) America, an era in which people pack into movie theaters to watch news reels about adventurous explorers like Charles Muntz, who travels the world on one epic quest after the next.

Young Carl Fredricksen idolizes Muntz: He spends his lonely days roaming his neighborhood pretending to be Muntz until one day he runs into Ellie, an energetic and fearless young girl (everything Carl is not) who idolizes Charles Muntz just as much as Carl does. Ellie and Carl cross their hearts then and there and swear to be great adventurers like Charles Muntz, and with that oath, theirs is a match made in heaven.

After that fateful first encounter, we get a truly beautiful montage of Carl and Ellie's life-long romance. We see the young kids grow into a teenage couple; see them get married and buy a house, working day jobs (balloon vendor) while saving up for the kind of adventures they fantasized about as kids. We watch the couple deal with the ups and downs, joys and tragedies of life; and gradually we watch them grow into old age, Ellie's "My Adventures" scrapbook still unfilled, even as her time on Earth ends.

With Ellie gone, Carl becomes a disgruntled old man desperately trying to hold on to a house, heirlooms and a lost-love he cherishes. A physical confrontation with neighborhood developers leads to Carl being forced into a retirement home for the rest of his days - but before the old man will give in he decides to honor the oath he and Ellie swore as kids and take one last shot at adventure! Carl ties an impossible number of balloons to his house (working a balloon cart at the zoo was his job for many years), rigs a steering system and UP he goes!

But there's a stowaway on board: a young boy scout-type named Russell (Jordan Nagai), who is desparately trying to earn his last merit badge assisting the elderly, for personal reasons that are as moving as a they are heartbreakingly naive. From that point on, the story mainly focuses on Carl trying to find room in his broken heart for love and friendship again, with Russell acting as his primary foil and simultaneous source of inspiration. Russell is also handy for providing the comedic relief the kids will get.

Of course there's a whole flying to South America, evil nemesis (Christopher Plummer), talking dogs/mythical bird adventure thrown in there. All of that stuff is pretty cool, and will be sure to entertain the kids. However, as one of the grownup kids, the story (for me) was all about Carl dealing with his profound sense of loss and love. The flying house escapism, fantastic creatures and evil villains were all just means and metaphors for that awesome emotional narrative.

No lie, there were a lot of sobs and sniffles around me in the theater. If you're old enough to know about love and loss, it's hard not to be affected by UP . By now it's no secret that Pixar knows how to tell a fantastic story, but who knew they could handle romantic drama so well? Superb work.

Visually, UP is just as stunning. The digital 3D tech employed for this film is far from a gimmick - it enhances the experience of the film by multitudes. When Carl and Russell are walking over cliffs or trekking through gorgeously rendered South American jungles, with an enormous floating 3D house harnessed to their backs, it's not just some of the most gorgeous eye-candy seen onscreen (the balloons are truly amazing), it's also a very clever and potent metaphor for grief. Rendered in 3D, those themes stood out loud and clear; the rest of the time, this movie was just a treat to look at.

I confess having wet eyes myself, not once, or twice, but on several instances during UP . Sometimes I was thinking, "This movie is breaking my heart." Other times I was thinking, "This movie is melting my heart." And sometimes, I was simply thinking, "This movie is so damn beautiful."

It definitely lifted me UP .

Pixar's Up follows widower Carl (Ed Asner) who travels to South America with young wilderness explorer Russell (Jordan Nagai) by attaching thousands of balloons to his home after the bank threatens to foreclose on it. Discovering the legendary Paradise Falls, Carl meets his childhood hero, explorer Charles Muntz. However, Muntz isn't the kind-hearted man Carl hoped he would be, and the grieving widower finds himself pitted against his former idol.

Movie Reviews
5 star movies

Before we get to the movie, let’s talk about the short. No Pixar movie going experience is ever complete unless it’s preceded by one of their trademark shorts, and Up is no exception. This time we’re primed for the feature by a journey into the world of Partly Cloudy . It’s a place where babies are made by clouds, who then hand their newly made toddlers over to storks for delivery. Our stork has the misfortune to end up delivering for a dark little rain cloud with a proclivity for birthing nothing but trouble. It’s no fun trying to carry a baby shark. Everyone has their favorite Pixar short. Mine’s Boundin’ which I have handy on DVD, just in case I’m ever feeling really down. Like Boundin’ and all the rest, Partly Cloudy is funny and sweet. It fits comfortably on a shelf with Pixar’s other work and while it may not be their most remarkable to date, if you’re a fan of those other brief snapshots of animation magic (and if not what’s wrong with you?), you’ll love this too. Like everything Pixar does, it’s great.

How great is Pixar? Their movies say more in five minutes without words than most other movies say in ten pages of dialogue. Pixar doesn’t need words to tell a story, they get that film is a visual medium and they’re strong believers in the old adage that a picture says a thousand words; though I’m pretty sure their pictures say at least a million.

That’s never truer than with Up , which opens with one of a heart-wrenching, tear-jerking montage. It happens almost entirely without dialogue. While a gentle waltz plays we meet Carl Frederickson as a little boy, and watch him meet his future wife Ellie. They bond over their mutual obsession with adventure and as they grow up and grow closer they make plans for an exciting journey to South America where they’ll traverse the jungles of Paradise Falls just like their favorite explorer Charles Muntz. They get married, they live their life walking hand in hand through joys and hardships, all right there flying past us on screen without a word. As the music plays and the pictures move, they keep dreaming of Paradise Falls while life keeps getting in the way. They never make their trip. They grow old. Their entire life together lived in a dazzling, delicate few minutes there on screen leaving the entire audience an emotional wreck as finally Carl is in front of us alone, embittered, and paralyzed by the wonderful, loving memories of his wife. If you’re human you’ll weep, you’ll cry, and just when you’re ready to randomly hug the next person who tries to squeeze past in the aisle, the movie starts.

Now though, every frame of Up is tinged with the beautiful, bittersweet notes of that fading romance, that perfect love we’ve already seen up on screen. We know everything there is to know about Carl, we understand him, we feel with him. Carl’s decision to abandon the world and float away seems sensible and right. So he does. He ties balloons to the house he built with his loving wife Ellie and floats away to live out the dream they were never able to achieve together. Of course things don’t go as planned. A neighborhood boy scout named Russell was inadvertently trapped on Carl’s porch when he took off and though they eventually make it to the jungle, a misjudged landing places them on the wrong side of a cliff. Forced to trek across difficult terrain on foot, the drag the buoyant house behind them. Carl is determined to live out his wife’s dream and Russell has no choice but to tag along. Along the way they meet Doug, a dog who can talk, and Kevin, a strange bird which Russell mistakes for a snipe.

There’s a bad guy and there’s conflict but all of that’s external. What makes Up such a perfect, touching success is the way director Pete Docter and his team cut right to the heart of the matter. This is not the story of an elderly man and his boyscout sidekick wandering through exotic jungles and fighting dastardly air pirates. Sure that happens, but it’s really the story of Carl coming to grips with the loss of his beloved wife and finding a way to move on. The rest is just window dressing. Magnificent window dressing yes, but it’s only the icing on the cake of Up’s stunning, deeply affecting story.

Up is playing in theaters in both 3D and standard 2D. I saw the 2D version for this review and you can read an in depth review of Up 3D from Cinema Blend’s Katey Rich right here . Maybe the 3D adds something, but whatever it adds Up doesn’t need it. Pixar uses pictures to deliver something that's so much more than visual. No matter how you see it, you’ll be moved by it. Real men cry at Up .

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(Film Review) UP: The Power of Now for New & Old Adventures

Louis Alloro, M.Ed., MAPP '08, is a cofounder of a 6-month Certificate in Applied Positive Psychology Program , Fellow at the Center for Advancement of Wellbeing at George Mason University, and founder of SOMO Leadership Labs , a community intervention. Web site . Full Bio .

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FILM REVIEW: UP, Disney Pixar film 2009. Preview here .

Last week I saw (from the first row, and in 3-D) Disney Pixar’s Up , an animated film about life, adventure, and friendship. The film certainly pulled on my heart strings in a very “other-people-matter” positive-psychology way. The film also speaks to this month’s theme of fun and play.

In it, a young hopeful and optimistic Carl Fredricksen becomes fascinated with a hero of his time, a world-famous aviator and explorer, Charles Muntz, who encourages imagination, creative play, and adventure.

Up opens with young Carl playing “explorer make-believe” by himself. He stumbles upon a tomboy named Ellie playing a similar game. A few frames later, these like-minded spirits become husband and wife, partners in life’s adventures.

Carl works as a balloon salesman, making people, especially Ellie, happy. The two hang on to adventure in their longstanding plan to travel to a waterfall in South America, a spot that Muntz made magical for them. They “crossed-their-hearts” to do this trip together.

Ellie becomes sick and dies, leaving Carl, now an older man named Mr. Fredricksen, to live their adventure solo. He works to keep Ellie’s spirit alive for himself with photos, scrapbooks, memorabilia, and imagined conversations—the same creative play that first brought them together.

Argentine Waterfall

Mr. Fredricksen is at first put off, convinced that he needs no help. But Russell has grit and persists. Mr. Fredricksen develops a relationship with Russell akin to the one he had with Ellie. The two need each other in that particular space at that particular time in common pursuit of their dreams.

For the young boy, being open and vulnerable come naturally , but Mr. Fredricksen needs time to open his seventy-eight-year-old heart to this new relationship that ultimately helps him fulfill the old dream of reaching the waterfall.

Reality & Fantasy: both what we create

Once they arrive there, Mr. Fredricksen finds a darker reality than existed in his lifelong fantasy. His childhood hero’s true colors are shown, and fortunately, he has his zesty and gritty friend Russell and others by his side as he navigates through some dark clouds.

As the film progresses, Carl becomes our hero, showing that it is never too late to realize old and new adventures. The film’s characters all demonstrate the intentional activity that Lyubormirsky describes as the part of happiness that we can control – they choose to be creative and have fun. They choose meaningful activities in line with their visions, their values, and their commitments – and of course those that put them in relationship to others. Adventure comes in relationships where palpable energy is created between like-minded spirits. However, these relationships don’t come all too easily. We learn that we have to look for them, take risks to become vulnerable in them, and then weave, in communion, the social fabric that brings dreams to life.

Up is not your traditional Disney Cinderella fairy tale film. Like Pixar’s other projects ( Wall E , The Incredibles ), there are socially conscious messages for children of all ages: the power of choosing adventure, the reality that heroes are not always as they appear, and the possibility that we can all be heroes-in-waiting ( see Phil Zimbardo’s work on the Lucifer effect or mine on Social-Emotional Leadership ).

The choice is ours to engage in relationships that involve risk, commitment, and fun.

References

Lyubomirsky, S. (2008). The How of Happiness: A Scientific Approach to Getting the Life You Want . New York: Penguin Books.

Zimbardo, P. (2008). The Lucifer Effect: Understanding How Good People Turn Evil . New York: Random House.

Images: Balloon picture from Disney Pixar free downloads

Waterfall on lake between Chili and Argentina courtesy of Rupert Taylor-Price

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Louis Alloro

Louis Alloro works with individuals, organizations, and communities as a change-agent -- coaching, training, and facilitating towards positive growth affecting people, planet, and profit. Website .

Food: Fun, Friends and Fulfillment: Positive Psychology and Paladares

This is your brain on pleasure, engagement, and meaning, you may also like, mapp magazine: international perspectives on well-being, be hopeful, be strong, be brave, be curious, why do we expect working moms to feel..., toward a more inclusive + accessible positive psychology, mapp magazine: work + well-being, will you go with me shared anticipatory savoring, awe: mapp magazine, enhancing mindfulness with character strengths, food, family, and flourishing: mapp magazine, character strengths and mindfulness work together.

Thanks for a really fun review, Louis. Now I want to see it even more. A friend of mine went to see it at a drive-in! I think that would be a great excursion.

Sure thing, Senia. I suggest you go with your significant other. It’s a great date movie (and a drive-in sounds real fun)!

Louis, I loved this film when I saw it and your review made me appreciate it on a whole new level. Now I want to see it again! Thanks for reminding me of the positive emotions and life lessons this film embodies so effortlessly.

You’re most welcome, Eleanor. I kind of want to see it again, too!

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Up (United States, 2009)

A film like Up makes it clear that Pixar has moved beyond the point where it feels the need to pander to children. Unlike its main animation competitor, Dreamworks, Pixar allows sophisticated themes and ideas to seep into its movies. Everything does not have to be simplified so that a seven-year old can understand what's going on. That's not to say that Pixar films should be seen as family unfriendly art films. Up , for example, includes plenty of jokes that kids will get and several unremarkable action scenes have been included with younger viewers in mind, but there's material of real substance - something increasingly lacking in animated films not tagged with the "Disney" label. Up is not as transcendent as last year's WALL-E , and doesn't rank near the top of Pixar's pantheon of great features, but it's a solid (and in some ways innovative) fantasy adventure that mixes comedy, action, and drama into a satisfying whole that is likely to please all but the most cantankerous curmudgeons.

Up falls under the umbrella of a tried-and-true formula: the old man/young kid "buddy film." This may be, however, the first time this Hollywood staple has been translated effectively into an animated format. As with most movies of this sort, the old guy - 78-year old Carl Fredricksen (voice of Edward Asner) - is a grumpy sort: set in his ways and not welcoming of strangers. The young guy - cub scout Russell (Jordan Nagai) - is full of innocence and wide-eyed optimism. During the course of the film, the two bond and learn from one another although, as is often the case, Carl's schooling strikes a little deeper. The boy who is a nuisance at the beginning has become a valued companion by the end.

From an emotional standpoint, the best thing about Up is the prologue. Running about 12 minutes, it's a masterpiece of economy, and it could stand on its own as a short. It's the story of Carl and Ellie - two misfit kids who find in each other perfect matches. They like the same things and play the same games. Both dream of adventuring far and wide when they grow up. It's only natural for them to spend their lives together, mixing dreams with reality. They marry, face the heartbreak of being unable to have children, and spend roughly seven decades with each other as their best friend. Then Ellie dies and Carl is left alone in a house rich with memories where every floorboard is imbued with Ellie's presence. As backstories go, this matches anything I have seen in any animated motion picture for heft and power. It brings a tear to the eye. Even Miyazaki couldn't have done better.

Once Ellie is gone, Carl decides to fulfill one of their long-time plans: visit Paradise Falls, a virtually uncharted place deep in the wilds of Venezuela. It was there that Carl and Ellie's childhood hero, Charles Muntz (Christopher Plummer), vanished along with his dirigible during an expedition in the 1930s. To make the trip to South America, Carl decides upon an unconventional means: he ties thousands upon thousands of helium-filled balloons to his house and lifts off. Unfortunately, when the house takes flight, there's an unexpected passenger aboard. Russell, knocking at the front door with the goal of "helping an old person" so he can earn a merit badge, is in the wrong place at the wrong time.

After Carl and Russell reach their goal (but not precisely where they want to be), Up becomes more conventional in its goals and approach. There are chase scenes, talking animals, and rotten-to-the-core villain. These are not bad things (and at least there's no Randy Newman song), but they prevent Up from maintaining the incredibly high level it achieves when it begins. Still, it will surprise me if any other 2009 animated film comes close to this one in terms of cross-generational appeal. It is worth wondering, however, if the movie may be too refined to capture the hearts, minds, and imaginations of children who have become accustomed to the limited pleasures of dumb animation.

Up is being offered in both 2D and 3D versions. I saw it in the former and was unaware of missing anything. Unlike some movies, this one does not the flaunt its 3D features in a way that those watching it in conventional theaters may feel as if they're missing something. The colors - especially those of the balloons and the plumage of a giant bird - are bright and cheerful, and will almost certainly lose something when diminished by the 3D glasses, so there's at least one compelling argument to see this in 2D. Regardless of how it's watched, Up showcases the fine animation that has become Pixar's hallmark. It is not as visionary as what we were presented with in WALL-E , but it puts to shame Dreamworks' Monsters vs. Aliens , where the obsession with 3D resulted in other shortcomings.

The vocal work is top-notch. Instead of seeking out big names to fill the roles, Pixar has found the "right" voices. Edward Asner and Christopher Plummer are not unknowns, but neither are they hot, A-list stars. Their voices are perfect for these parts and viewers are not left with afterimages of their real-life features burned onto those of the animated characters. Asner, as has been noted, sounds a lot like Lionel Barrymore's Scrooge (a role the late actor played annually in a radio play during the 1930s and 1940s) - an appropriate reference given The Christmas Carol transformation of Carl's character - and Plummer has great pipes for suggesting menace.

Up is not my favorite Pixar movie, but I welcome its arrival. I'd rather see dozens of movies like this than one more ugly sequel to Shrek or Madagascar or Ice Age . Pixar views their films as creative and artistic endeavors; Dreamworks and Fox see theirs as products. With Pixar, it's about the movie. With most other animated features, it's about the marketing. There are some great moments in Up , and it may be the funniest thing Pixar has done in a long time, but even the aspects of Up that lack greatness are not bad, and that's worth applauding.

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Beauty and the Beast (1991)
Grave of the Fireflies (1993)
Shrek (2001)
Grinch, The (2018)
Quest for Camelot, The (1998)
Emoji Movie, The (2017)
(There are no more better movies of (voices) Edward Asner)
(There are no more worst movies of (voices) Edward Asner)
Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, The (2011) (2011)
Beautiful Mind, A (2001)
Syriana (2005)
Dracula 2000 (2000)
National Treasure (2004)
Alexander (2004)
(There are no more better movies of Jordan Nagai)
(There are no more worst movies of Jordan Nagai)

Reviewed by: Ethan Samuel Rodgers CONTRIBUTOR


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Paradise in the Bible

Featuring	, , Jordan Nagai, Bob Peterson, Delroy Lindo, Jerome Ranft, John Ratzenberger, David Kaye, Elie Docter, Jeremy Leary, Mickie McGowan, Danny Mann, Donald Fullilove, Jess Harnell, Josh Cooley, Pete Docter
Director
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I t simply is astounding how, what are essentially drawings, can extract so much emotion and intimate feelings out of us as human beings. As I sit in a theater, my mind tells me I am watching fiction, something which man has created for entertainment, and, in this case, laughter. Logic says that a film is nothing more than light projected onto a screen. But Pixar has somehow found a way, yet again, to convince my heart that there’s something more to movies than just light and sound.

Carl Fredrickson is the picturesque portrait of an ordinary American senior citizen. He’s grown old with his once adventurous wife and found that life has quite a way of passing you by. Carl’s dream, and his wife Ellie’s dream, was always to travel to Paradise Falls in South America, a place that is said to be “forgotten by time.” They planned from childhood to fly away and leave the world behind on a grand adventure, but like so many plans we make that get lost in the buzz of everyday life, Carl and Ellie never quite get around to it, and before Carl realizes it, he is not only too old for their adventure, he is also alone after Ellie passes away.

His plan, it seems, is to live in his house in solitude, harkening back to memories of his beloved, while awaiting his own death, but when an unfortunate and unintended accident occurs in Carl’s front lawn, he finds himself labeled as a “menace to society” and is ordered by a court to move to a retirement community and sell his house to the corporate “big-shots” that have been salivating over his property for years waiting to move forward with a grand building project. So Carl, realizing he has finally come upon his now or never moment, does just what he had planned to do so many years ago: he (quite literally) flies away on his grand adventure.

Parents will find this tale more deeply rooted in emotion and morals than past installments from Pixar. The life lessons exemplified throughout, such as “never let life pass you by,” or “true joy is only happiness when it is shared” are a welcomed spectacle to the big-screen following the environmental bombshell dropped in WALL-E. The things Carl Fredrickson learns along his journey through character interaction and development are both heartwarming and touching, and are as real as you and I, although he himself is only light on a screen and the voice of an actor.

What else is certainly real and present is the humor, which in a film such as this is not only welcomed, but expected. Although the humor stems more so from a slapstick perspective, rather than a witty or clever one, the comedic routine displayed primarily by Russell, a tagalong boy scout who finds friendship and guardianship in Carl, as well as the various animals showcased in Paradise Falls to include talking dogs and a giant Dodo-esque bird creature, is universally entertaining and will leave most, if not all, movie goers, at the very least, chuckling. And to my surprise, not one of these jokes were sexual, offensive or questionable in any way.

To the writers’ credit, even when there are more somber moments that move away from the humor, you’ll find yourself grinning with delight in Carl and Russell’s accomplishments as I did, as the whole movie plays to what I refer to as the “deep down good feeling.” By that I mean that, even though things go wrong, and there is conflict, ultimately joy and happiness win out and leave you with a deeper feeling and a longer lasting grin than a simpler story would.

The plot itself is fairly solid throughout and is told expeditiously, which keeps the yawns of children to a minimum. There’s a short stretch in the middle where I found myself waiting for the tale to move along, but save that interlude, I found the story to be not only understandable and interesting, but quite clever in the manner it was told. Let’s be honest, everyone has read or seen the “run away” story, but this particular perspective of “floating away” added quite a bit to the overall entertainment value of the film.

The plot itself, however, is where I did find my biggest flaw. As all stories have a protagonist, in this case Carl, so do all stories have an antagonist. In this film it is an explorer named Charles Muntz, a man whose life dream it has been to capture the thought-to-be-extinct bird that lives in Paradise Falls. Muntz’s character was quite frankly underdeveloped, shallow, and, moreover, controversial. In one scene, he is portrayed as a hero and a hospitable gentleman, but quickly changes in a Dr. Jekyll/Mr. Hyde fashion into a maddened, obsessed lunatic bent on capturing the bird without regard to even human life. My complaint to the story tellers would be simply this: why did he go from 0 to 100 in the story, and why do we know so little about him? I suppose “time constraints” would be the logical answer, but, nonetheless, Muntz is surely the weak chain in the story.

He is, also, the only source of violence. Muntz orders the capturing of Carl and Russell by his vicious attack dogs, wields a gun, sets Carl’s house on fire, and even attempts to drop Russell out of his giant blimp, the “spirit of adventure.” All of this could potentially be a bit unnerving to the youngest of audiences, but it’s kept in check. As I stated earlier, however, this film found a few extra ways to seek out emotion in its audience, and one of the emotions is most definitely fear, or perhaps uncertainty to put it more mildly.

I think to truly grasp the meaning of this film, one must sit down in the possibly gum covered seat of the theater and understand that there’s more to a movie than lights and sound. Carl Fredrickson may not be a real man, but he feels what we as real people feel every day: the disappointment of life, the unexpected loss of a dream, or even the loss of a loved one. Sometimes, though, we focus so much on what we wish we could do, on what we want to change, or on the adventure we wish we could embark upon, that we miss the adventure happening all around us, because life is the greatest of all adventures, and God intends us to enjoy and learn from it every step of the way.

John 10:10 — “Jesus came so we could have an abundant life.”

My advice, learn sooner than Carl did that there’s an adventure waiting around every corner; you just have to be willing to see it.

Violence: Minor / Profanity: None / Sex/Nudity: None

See list of Relevant Issues—questions-and-answers .

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Comments about “Partly Cloudy,” the short that precedes showings of “Up” in theaters

J.J. Abrams Teams Up Glen Powell and Jenna Ortega for Next Movie

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Beetlejuice Beetlejuice star Jenna Ortega is in talks to join Glen Powell in an upcoming J.J. Abrams movie, which would be the first film Abrams has directed since Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker .

According to Deadline , Ortega is in talks to join the upcoming Abrams film, and would star opposite Glen Powell , who is nearing the finalization of his deal to join the film . The exact details of the plot are unknown at this time, but it is noted that it is NOT a time travel movie . The untitled Warner Bros. project was written by Abrams, and will be produced under his Bad Robot banner. Ortega is set to appear in the highly anticipated sequel, Beetlejuice Beetlejuice , which hits theaters Sept. 6, 2024. Ortega joins Michael Keaton and Winona Ryder, who return to reprise their roles from the 1988 classic. Iconic director, Tim Burton, also returns to helm the project.

2024's Biggest Box Office Surprise Revived a Dying Genre

Twisters blew past box office projections to become one of the most beloved, critically acclaimed summer blockbusters of 2024

As Powell nears the finalization of his deal for the untitled Abrams project, the actor is enjoying a plethora of success. 2024 has certainly been the year of Powell, as he's fresh off two incredibly successful films. The star catapulted Richard Linklater's crime comedy, Hit Man , to the top of Netflix's streaming charts earlier in the year. The film garnered overwhelming praise, currently holding a 95% critics score on Rotten Tomatoes, and showcased Powell's undeniable charisma as a leading man. Powell also starred in one of the most successful films of the summer season with Twisters , the Lee Isaac Chung-directed sequel to the 1996 classic natural disaster film. Twisters has brought in an impressive $195.6 million domestically, as the film continues to find success in theaters.

J.J. Abrams Hasn't Directed Since Rise of Skywalker

While Abrams remains as one of Hollywood's most prominent producers, it has been many years since Abrams last directed a film. After directing the enormously successful Star Wars: The Force Awakens , the director was brought back to cap off the Skywalker saga in 2019. Since then, Abrams has been busy producing films such as the latest Mission: Impossible sequels, and currently serves as executive producer for Amazon's animated series, Batman: Caped Crusader .

'It Blew My Mind': Jenna Ortega Describes Working With Michael Keaton as Beetlejuice

Jenna Ortega compared Michael Keaton’s Beetlejuice to “an animal with a gun” when she saw the actor in character for the first time.

Back in 2019, Abrams signed a massive $250 million content deal with WarnerMedia, now known as Warner Bros. Discovery, which allowed Abrams to keep his Bad Robot television and movie deals under the same roof. The exclusive deal encompassed other forms of media such as video games as well. Due to the writers strike, Warner Bros. briefly suspended their TV deal with Abrams, but reinstated the deal after the strike ended.

There is no official release date for the untitled Abrams movie yet.

Source: Deadline

Star Wars: Episode IX - The Rise of Skywalker

In the riveting conclusion of the landmark Skywalker saga, new legends will be born-and the final battle for freedom is yet to come.

J.J. Abrams

'When Calls the Heart' Fans Will Adore Seeing These Stars' Latest Hallmark Movie Update

Hallmark gave a look at Pascale Hutton and Kavan Smith's new film Nelly Knows Mysteries: A Fatal Engagement.

preview for Meet the “When Calls the Heart” Cast

The actors play couple Lee and Rosemary Coulter on When Calls the Heart , and the duo have also starred in two movies together for the Hallmark Channel. Well, they are now working together on the film Nelly Knows Mysteries: A Fatal Engagement , which is set to air on Hallmark Mystery on Friday, August 23 at 9 p.m. ET.

While the announcement was initially made in early July, fans got a first look at Pascale and Kavan back in action in a first look for their new movie. Thanks to a promo clip posted on When Calls the Heart 's official Instagram on August 1, viewers get to see the two in action as they embrace an all-new genre for the network.

"#Hearties! Here’s your FIRST LOOK at @phutton and @kavansmith in the all new #NellyKnowsMysteries: A Fatal Engagement!" read the caption for the snippet. "Save the date for August 23rd at 9/8c on @hallmarkmystery!"

When fans noticed this Hallmark update with Pascale and Kavan, they immediately cheered their excitement about them trying their hand at a brand-new project.

"Hallmark feeding our Pascale and Kavan obsession," one person wrote in the comments. "These two are great together! Hope more than 1 mystery is in store!" another declared. "I can't wait to see Pascale and Kavan bring their fun dynamic to the mystery genre! 🥳 I am so excited to enjoy this all-new movie! ☺️," a different follower added.

While Pascale and Kavan are keeping mum about the details of the movie, Hallmark did divulge part of the plot.

According to Hallmark Mysteries' official page for the movie , Nelly Knows Mysteries: A Fatal Engagement will follow an advice columnist named Nelly who wants to find out who killed her best friend's boyfriend. As she teams up with a handsome detective named Michael, the two set out to prove that her best friend is not the one who committed the murder.

hallmark pascale hutton kavan smith nelly knows mysteries instagram

It's almost time to put our thinking caps on and figure out whodunit!

As the entertainment and news editorial assistant for Good Housekeeping , Adrianna (she/her) writes about everything TV, movies, music and pop culture. She graduated from Yeshiva University with a B.A. in journalism and a minor in business management. She covers shows like The Rookie , 9-1-1 and Grey's Anatomy , though when she’s not watching the latest show on Netflix, she’s taking martial arts or drinking way too much coffee.

@media(max-width: 64rem){.css-o9j0dn:before{margin-bottom:0.5rem;margin-right:0.625rem;color:#ffffff;width:1.25rem;bottom:-0.2rem;height:1.25rem;content:'_';display:inline-block;position:relative;line-height:1;background-repeat:no-repeat;}.loaded .css-o9j0dn:before{background-image:url(/_assets/design-tokens/goodhousekeeping/static/images/Clover.5c7a1a0.svg);}}@media(min-width: 48rem){.loaded .css-o9j0dn:before{background-image:url(/_assets/design-tokens/goodhousekeeping/static/images/Clover.5c7a1a0.svg);}} The Best Movies to Watch

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"What would you say if your daughter told you her boyfriend pushed her down the stairs but it's okay because really it was just an accident?" Questions like this are at the heart of "It Ends with Us,” based on the bestselling novel of the same name by Colleen Hoover . This is a message picture about what it takes to break the vicious cycle of domestic violence. It is not subtle.

After the emotional turmoil of her estranged father's funeral in Maine, our heroine, the impeccably fashionable Lily Bloom ( Blake Lively , the best clotheshorse movie star since Kay Francis), breaks into a rooftop to peer at the vast beauty of Boston's skyline. Before she can do much introspection, she meets the impossibly handsome and impossibly named Ryle Kincaid ( Justin Baldoni , also the film's director), a neurosurgeon (naturally). Baldoni comes barreling into the scene like a hurricane, hurling a pair of steel chairs across the rooftop in anger. Instead of repulsion from this violent act, Lily finds herself intrigued and drawn to his charm and megawatt smile. Their playful patter, peppered with barbs veiled as flirtation from Ryle, ramps up until the dashing surgeon is summoned back to the hospital by his beeper.

This is of course not the last we see of Ryle. He just happens to be the brother of Allysa ( Jenny Slate ), the quirky rich and bored housewife Lily hires to help her run the Cottagecore florist shop of her dreams. Although Lily repeatedly insists that she just wants to be friends, Ryle pursues her, ignoring her many pleas just as flagrantly as she ignores all his red flags. Lust is a hell of a drug.

Quickly, Ryle's negs and flirtatious barbs ramp up, transforming into toxic jealousy and other forms of obsessive behavior. This includes inviting himself to dinner with her mother by dropping the L-word for the first time, one of several such instances of emotional manipulation he brandishes like a silver-tipped dagger. Before she knows it, Lily is not only in a relationship she didn't really want, she herself becomes an outlet for Ryle's raging temper.

The early scenes of Lily and Ryle's volatile courtship are interwoven with scenes in which teenage Lily ( Isabela Ferrer ) falls in love for the first time with a schoolmate named Atlas ( Alex Neustaedter ). The soulful boy is squatting in the abandoned house across the street from hers, fleeing his mother’s abusive boyfriend. The generous and nonjudgmental Lily offers both aid and friendship when Atlas needs it the most. He in turn offers her a caring shoulder and a safe place to finally express the fear she feels as she watches her father physically abuse her own mother over and over again.

These scenes are innocent and tender, the two young actors imbuing the teenagers with just the right balance of world weariness from the violence they’ve already endured and the irrepressible hope that comes with youth. Yet, Baldoni and his team of editors ( Oona Flaherty and Robb Sullivan ) can't quite find the right balance between these scenes and the more erotic and violent scenes featuring Baldoni and Lively. However, once Brandon Sklenar (doing his best Harry Connick, Jr. in " Hope Floats ") enters as the grown-up Atlas, he is able to craft an effortless, natural chemistry with Lively that is nearly as strong as these early moments, although they both are far too fleeting.

This story of love, trauma and abuse is wrapped up in the same amber-hued autumnal glow of Lively’s bestie Taylor Swift ’s short film for her autobiographical song "All Too Well (10 Minute Version)," which itself is about an abusive relationship. Lily even has the same tousled strawberry blonde tresses as the short film's star Sadie Sink . So naturally, the film's most climatic moment of domestic abuse, like the short, takes place in the couple's kitchen. Later, the moment where Lily comes into her own power as she attempts to rebuild her life is underscored by Swift's "My Tears Ricochet" (which perhaps counts as a spoiler if you know the topic of the song. Swifties, I'm sorry.)

"It Ends with Us" is a fine-looking picture. Baldoni and cinematographer Barry Peterson know how to frame movie star faces in flattering medium close-ups, allowing every nuanced emotion, every twinkle in their eyes to transport the viewers on this emotional journey with them, even when the characters feel more like didactic cyphers than fully-realized human beings. Lily’s flower shop (which never seems to have any customers) is a Pinterest board brought to life. And Lively’s designer duds are nearly as showstopping as the ones she sports in “ A Simple Favor .”

Lively does her best to add emotional layers to Lily so we see her internal growth, but this process is often hampered by the film around her. I kept thinking of " Alice, Darling ,” Mary Nighy's incredible film about intimate partner violence from a few years back in which Anna Kendrick finds herself suffocating in a psychologically abusive relationship. In that film, Kendrick's character is given a full life and a group of friends who help her overcome the codependent trap she's been caged in. Here, the few women in Lily's life – her so-called best friend Allysa and her mother Jenny ( Amy Morton ) – are underdeveloped, relegated to a handful of scenes that largely exist as plot points.

The PG-13 rating keeps the violence Ryle inflicts on Lily, or her father's violence in the flashbacks, to a minimum visually (and often seen in slow motion or in choppy montages), Christy Hall ’s script unfortunately often falls into "as the father of daughters" territory, giving more care to explaining why these men are the way they are (especially in Ryle's case, in the film's most cringe-worthy twist) than it does to the psychology – let alone the economics – of why women often stay with abusive partners. Instead, this subject, which should really be the key to the whole story, is covered in one very short scene between Lily and her mother. The forced love triangle once Atlas re-enters Lily's adult life also restricts things, causing Lily's life to once again orbit mostly around the men in it.

"It Ends with Us" is certainly not a bad film. At times, it's actually quite good and its central message is crafted with intention and care. I just wish it had a sharper focus on Lily's interiority, her life beyond her trauma, and who she really is in relation to herself, and herself alone.

Marya E. Gates

Marya E. Gates is a freelance film and culture writer based in Los Angeles and Chicago. She studied Comparative Literature at U.C. Berkeley, and also has an overpriced and underused MFA in Film Production. Other bylines include Moviefone, The Playlist, Crooked Marquee, Nerdist, and Vulture.

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Film credits.

It Ends with Us (2024)

Rated PG-13

131 minutes

Blake Lively as Lily Bloom

Justin Baldoni as Ryle Kincaid

Brandon Sklenar as Atlas Corrigan

Jenny Slate as Allysa

Hasan Minhaj as Marshall

Justin Baldoni
Christy Hall

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Borderlands Ending and Post-Credits Explained: Does the Movie Set Up Future Installments?

Is this movie just a bunch of claptrap.

Let's make this simple: You want to know if there are any post- or mid-credits scenes in Borderlands. The answer is kinda - but it’s really more of a very brief mini-scene that functions as a parody of a credits scene.

Full spoilers for Borderlands follow!

It has been a rough road for Eli Roth’s Borderlands movie, which is finally out in theaters now more than three years after it wrapped its initial production in June of 2021 - and after acclaimed Chernobyl and The Last of Us writer Craig Mazin’s name was removed from the film completely, even though he’d written the script that was first expected to be used when Roth was hired as director back in 2020. (Roth now also has both a Story By and Screenplay credit.)

Following a ton of bad buzz, release date delays, and a two-week round of reshoots in 2023 that were directed not by Roth but by Tim Miller (Deadpool), the film has been greeted by absolutely abysmal reviews, including by Matt Donato here at IGN . And yeah, gotta say I agree with Matt and most everyone else, because Borderlands is a pretty awful viewing experience, with its attempts at humor, action and drama all falling flat and the entire movie feeling notably inert nearly start to finish.

But how does it all end? With the bad reviews, maybe you’re skipping seeing it and just want to cut to the chase. So that’s what we’re here to dive into!

Borderlands movie images

Borderlands Movie Ending Explained

The brunt of Borderlands involves intergalactic bounty hunter Lilith (Cate Blanchett) reluctantly teaming with soldier Roland (Kevin Hart), bomb-loving kid Tiny Tina (Ariana Greenblatt), robot Claptrap (voiced by Jack Black), reformed Psycho Krieg (Florian Munteanu) and, eventually, scientist Tannis (Jamie Lee Curtis) to find the legendary hidden vault on the planet Pandora and the secrets left inside eons ago by the alien race known as the Eridians. And if you’re a fan of the games saying “Since when is Lilith a bounty hunter?” you’ll notice plenty of other tweaks from the games throughout the movie and its conclusion.

Should there be a sequel to the Borderlands movie?

Lilith’s group needs three keys to get into the vault and, after retrieving two of them, they come to discover the third key is a person. That person seems to be Tina, who reveals she is not actually the biological daughter of Atlas (Edgar Ramírez) – the scheming corporate head who hired Lilith to find Tina for him – but rather a clone he made from Eridian blood with the single purpose of helping him open the vault to access its secrets and power. During a battle with the bandits known as Psychos, Roland serves as a distraction, allowing the others to escape – and they suddenly teleport to safety to everyone’s surprise, with phasewalking appearing to be a newfound ability of Tina’s.

When Tina overhears Atlas contacting Lilith, asking her to betray Tina, she mistakenly assumes she’s going to go along with it – like a lot of the movie, it’s dumb, and could have been solved with a few more seconds of conversation – leading her to set off a bomb, knocking Lilith out. Tina, Tannis and Krieg go to the newly discovered vault entrance to open it on their own, while Lilith awakens and, accompanied by Claptrap, stumbles upon an old, abandoned settlement, which just so happens to be where Lilith grew up.

They go into her childhood home and, upon seeing it and Lilith’s drawings on the wall, something is activated inside Claptrap he himself had forgotten about, causing a holographic recording of Lilith’s late mother (Haley Bennett) to appear before her. She explains that Lilith is the one who can actually open the vault, which is why her mom sent her away to safety with Tannis years before, to avoid her being discovered. Lilith is also an Eridian and realizes she’s the one that can phasewalk, not Tina.

Rise of the Phoenix… I Mean Firehawk

At the vault entrance, Tina – sure she is “special” and that opening the vault will make her invincible – attempts to complete the process to open it, but fails. Then Atlas, with all of his soldiers and the Psychos helping, him arrives. Atlas intends to kill Tina, believing her to be another botched clone and intending to try again with another one to get the vault open. Roland then shows up to help Tina and the others, having survived his encounter with the Psychos thanks to a bomb given to him by Tina. And then, in an incredibly random moment, the leader of Atlas’ forces, Commander Knoxx (Janina Gavankar), suddenly switches sides and stands with Roland, Tina, Tannis and Krieg because of one quick throwaway interaction she had with Roland earlier in the film about fighting on the wrong side - only to be disintegrated immediately by a blast from Atlas’ ship.

But when all hope seems lost, Lilith arrives, informing everyone that she is the one who can open the vault. Tina is initially distraught, saying she thought she was special, but Lilith tells her she still is (just not in the cool superpowered way Lilith is). Lilith then makes a shaky deal with Atlas that he’ll let everyone go if she opens the vault for him, and when she begins to do so, she is suddenly enveloped in energy, burning bright from within, with fiery wings keeping her afloat in full Jean Grey upgrade mode. And so we learn she is the Firehawk. Rather than a name Lilith already sometimes used herself, as was the case in the games, the Firehawk was oh-so quickly mentioned earlier in the movie as a legendary deity. Now, seeing what’s happening to Lilith, Tannis has a couple of lines about prophecies being fulfilled, yadda yadda, and it turns out Lilith has the touch, Lilith has the power, yeah.

Not only is Lilith able to fly and fight Atlas’ forces with her powers, but she is able to create energy shields around her friends, allowing them to fight back as well. At one point, she is knocked to the ground, causing everyone’s shields to drop, but some encouraging words from Tannis gets her back on her feet. All of their enemies are soon defeated by our heroes except for Atlas himself, who manages to grab Tina, threatening to kill her unless he’s brought inside the vault. Lilith obliges, phasewalking the three of them inside, where Atlas is amazed by all of the old artifacts he sees around them - before Tina kicks him in the leg and runs to Lilith. Suddenly, Atlas is grabbed by the tentacles of a large creature inside the vault while Lilith and Tina escape.

And yes, this is a very rushed and anticlimactic final showdown with your primary villain for any movie, but also especially so for a movie based on games where you tend to actually have a full fight with a giant monster in a vault at the end - not just see part of a monster for a second as it conveniently grabs your enemy for you.

Soon after, in a nearby town, the locals celebrate Atlas’ demise. A couple of kids kick the helmet of one of Atlas’ dead soldiers around, and it may or may not have someone’s head inside, given this is Eli Roth including a self-reference to his far more entertaining Hostel: Part II, which ended with kids playing soccer with the decapitated head of a villain.

Borderlands: Games to Movie Comparison

Outside on a balcony, Lilith and her friends all celebrate, watching a huge fireworks display. Lilith, at Tina’s urging, turns on her Firehawk powers and flies into the air, making a huge bird in the sky. In voiceover, Lilith, who’d always spoken of Pandora disparagingly, now says it’s home.

Is There a Mid- or Post-Credits Scene in Borderlands?

After the initial main credits play, we cut to a black screen and Claptrap appears on top of it singing and dancing for what looks to be a mid-credit scene kicking off - except the remaining closing credit crawl begins coming up from the bottom of the screen almost immediately and physically hits Claptrap, knocking him on his side on top of the first credit line. He screams in protest that he’s just giving the people what they want as the credits continue to push him up and offscreen. And that’s it!

In a movie devoid of much genuine entertainment, this is a relatively decent gag involving a mid-credit scene literally pushed away by the credits themselves.

Does Borderlands Set Up Future Installments?

Not really. There isn’t much in the way of direct set-up for more stories beyond the fact that Lilith now has these powers and a new group of pals who could presumably have more adventures with her. Atlas seems to be dead but there is some wiggle room there if they wanted to say he escaped that creature.

Notably though, we don’t ever learn what exactly was in the vault or what it could do. We see a lot of doohickies floating about and are told that what’s in there can basically unlock the secrets of the universe, but that’s all the info we get and it doesn’t feel like Lilith and the others actually care that much about these secrets once they escape.

Of course, maybe the lack of a direct sequel set-up is because Lionsgate saw the writing on the wall with this prolonged, continually troubled production. And given both the wretched reviews and the weak box office opening the film is receiving, this is likely the one and only movie for this incarnation of Borderlands before someone tries again down the line.

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The Instigators review: Matt Damon and Casey Affleck pair up in the latest movie made for your dad

Matt Damon and Casey Affleck sit in the front two seats of a car.

For a streaming service associated with the bleeding edge of tech, Apple TV+ has grown surprisingly nostalgic in its curation.

Much of its recent slate feels like a throwback to the 90s heyday of mid-budget cinema, encompassing a booze-soaked postmodern noir (Sugar), a legal thriller based on an 80s paperback (Presumed Innocent), and the latest releases from Ridley Scott ( Napoleon ) and Martin Scorsese ( Killers of the Flower Moon ).

In short: Apple TV+ now specialises in content for your dad.

With its heist-gone-wrong premise and a feast of meaty character actors, The Instigators is the streamer's latest bid at reverse-engineering the kind of late-night TV movie best enjoyed in one's favourite armchair with a beer in hand.

Matt Damon and Casey Affleck return to their Boston roots as Rory and Cobby, two fumbling, good-natured crooks roped into a high-stakes election night heist. Neither character exists beyond their broad strokes; Rory's ex-marine and absent father needs a payout to make things up to his kid, while Cobby's an alcoholic criminal on parole with a self-destructive streak. At least both leads appreciably inject a sagging, mid-life misery into their thinly sketched characters.

The job itself – a swift retrieval of cash from a poorly-guarded safe – could hardly be more simple, yet manages to get bungled at every turn. Throw in an aggressive idiot with a gun (a surprise turn by Jack Harlow, Gen Z's premier white boy rapper), a crooked mayor (played by Ron Perlman in a red tie) with secrets stashed away, and the two low-level criminals quickly find themselves stumbling into a city-wide manhunt.

Jack Harlow sits on a couch surrounded by three men.

The film quickly blitzes through this set-up, as if it's terrified you'll start scrolling on your phone. Characters and motivations are introduced with the passionless efficacy of a roll call, squandering the joys of spending time with a top-shelf supporting cast that includes Michael Stuhlbarg and Alfred Molina as the masterminds of the operation. Ving Rhames' fedora-wearing special agent is introduced as a mysterious figure emerging from the shadows, the film lightly insinuating that Luther has been air-dropped in from Mission: Impossible.

The Instigators eventually finds its footing as a frothy chase movie. With both sides of the law closing in, as well as the ticking timer of a gunshot wound, Rory has nowhere to turn but the office of his therapist Donna (Hong Chau; The Whale ). Chau dials back the sinister overtones of recent performances (including last month's Kinds of Kindness ), but preserves her placid, not-quite-deadpan intonation – an essential counterbalance to the incessant bickering between the leads.

Matt Damon and Hong Chau talk next to a yellow car.

In a film stuffed with bozos, Donna's intelligence becomes a running joke. The biggest laughs come from her transition from lawful neutral to chaotic good, whether she's negotiating her own hostage situation or playing rock-paper-scissors with competing factions of criminals and enforcers.

The screenplay (by Affleck and Chuck Maclean) may be funny enough to buoy its bog-standard crime drama, but the surrounding film is too hastily stitched together to generate any kind of momentum. Dialogue scenes are regularly marred by wonky shot compositions and stammered editing; the few action beats are barely more exciting, even when a horde of police cars bear down on Rory and Cobby. Curiously absent is the slick kineticism that director Doug Liman flexed several months ago in his Road House remake.

Matt Damon and Casey Affleck wear worksuits and beanies in this heist scene.

Between The Instigators and the upcoming Wolves, which stars George Clooney and Brad Pitt, Apple TV+ seems to be specifically heisting the cast of Ocean's Eleven.

But the intervening decades have undeniably eroded the Ocean's gang's lustre. Damon still occupies a niche in prestige dramas, but no longer retains the thrilling versatility that saw him morph into Will Hunting, Private Ryan, Tom Ripley and Jason Bourne. Few people can name a George Clooney movie from the last decade. Casey Affleck and Brad Pitt have enjoyed recent Oscar wins, but face troubling allegations .

Even at a breezy 100 minutes, The Instigators can't outrun the march of time; the dad movie is in desperate need of a fresh start.

The Instigators is streaming on Apple TV+ now.

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IMAGES

Up Up & Up (2019)
THE MOVIE SHELF: UP Review: Pixar Is Up, Up And Away With A Film
Up Up & Up (2019)
Up movie review
Pixar's Up Movie Review: Beyond The Trailer
Disney Pixar Up

COMMENTS

Up movie review & film summary (2009)
"Up" is a wonderful film, with characters who are as believable as any characters can be who spend much of their time floating above the rain forests of Venezuela. They have tempers, problems and obsessions. They are cute and goofy, but they aren't cute in the treacly way of little cartoon animals. They're cute in the human way of the animation master Hayao Miyazaki. Two of the three central ...
From Pixar, the House That Soared
Up. Directed by Pete Docter, Bob Peterson. Animation, Adventure, Comedy, Family. PG. 1h 36m. By Manohla Dargis. May 28, 2009. In its opening stretch the new Pixar movie "Up" flies high, borne ...
Up
Tom Charity CNN.com Funny and poignant and full of life, Up easily qualifies as one of the best movies of the year so far. Go with someone you care about. Jul 6, 2010 Full Review Cosmo Landesman ...
Up Movie Review
Parents need to know that Up is the second Pixar movie (after The Incredibles) to receive a PG rating, mostly due to a few potentially frightening scenes involving a band of trained talking dogs trying to get rid of the protagonists, some moments where characters almost fall from a floating house, and some guns firing.That said, it's Disney/Pixar, so the violence is mild.
'Up' Review: 2009 Pixar Movie
Movies; Movie Reviews 'Up': Film Review. Winsome, touching and arguably the funniest Pixar effort ever, the gorgeously rendered, high-flying adventure is a tidy 90-minute distillation of all ...
Up (2009)
Up: Directed by Pete Docter, Bob Peterson. With Edward Asner, Christopher Plummer, Jordan Nagai, Bob Peterson. 78-year-old Carl Fredricksen travels to Paradise Falls in his house equipped with balloons, inadvertently taking a young stowaway.
Up (2009)
User Reviews. Carl Fredricksen (Ed Asner) as a young quiet kid idolized explorer Charles Muntz (Christopher Plummer) and his discovery of Paradise Falls. Ellie is much more animated and also a great fan of Muntz. Together they would marry and live their lives together until the day she dies.
Up (2009)
A three-hankie weepie and a cliffhanging thriller. A cross-generational odd-couple buddy movie; a story of man and dog. A tale of sharply observed melancholy truths and whimsically unfettered nonsense. Directed by Pete Docter and Bob Peterson. Edward Asner, Christopher Plummer, Jordan Nagai, Bob Peterson, Delroy Lindo, Jerome Ranft.
The Movie Review: 'Up'
Up is not without flaws. Carl and Russell's equatorial odyssey at times settles for cliche, and there may be one or two too many aerial cliffhangers during the climax. But such concerns barely ...
Up (2009)
Up (2009) - Movies, TV, Celebs, and more... Menu. Movies. Release Calendar Top 250 Movies Most Popular Movies Browse Movies by Genre Top Box Office Showtimes & Tickets Movie News India Movie Spotlight. TV Shows. ... Metacritic reviews. Up. 88. Metascore. 37 reviews · Provided by Metacritic.com. 100.
Up (2009 film)
Up is a 2009 American animated comedy-drama adventure film produced by Pixar Animation Studios and released by Walt Disney Pictures.The film was directed by Pete Docter, co-directed by Bob Peterson, and produced by Jonas Rivera.Docter and Peterson also wrote the film's screenplay and story, with Tom McCarthy co-writing the latter. The film stars the voices of Ed Asner, Christopher Plummer ...
‎Up (2009) directed by Pete Docter • Reviews, film
The greatest adventure is just getting back home. Carl Fredricksen spent his entire life dreaming of exploring the globe and experiencing life to its fullest. But at age 78, life seems to have passed him by, until a twist of fate (and a persistent 8-year old Wilderness Explorer named Russell) gives him a new lease on life. Remove Ads. Cast. Crew.
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Pixar's 2009 family film "UP" shows that not only can they make us cry uncontrollably in the first ten minutes of a film, but also that sentimentality and lo...
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The Marshall family are supportive and loving. Sco. Mild peril but no harm comes to any characters. Ch. Parents need to know that Up, Up, and Away is a Disney comedy about a family of superheroes. It has many hallmarks of a TV movie -- most notably the laughable special effects -- and subsequently might not hold the attention of media-savvy ...
Movie Review: Up (2009)
Instead, this film may be their strongest showing yet. Continuing through the door that WALL-E ripped open, Up too, tells a powerful tale without wasting words or packing the 96 minute running time with unneeded filler material. It gets going with an unexpectedly moving and heartfelt montage laying out the younger years of Carl Fredericksen ...
Up Review
But when a big-city real-estate developer manages to get Carl evicted from his house and sent to an old-age home, our elderly hero takes action. Former balloon salesman that he is, Carl turns the ...
Up Movie Review for Parents
The most recent home video release of Up movie is December 3, 2012. Here are some details… Home Video Notes: Up (3D) Release Date: 4 December 2012. Disney Studios re-releases Up to home video in a 3D version. The 5 Disc package includes a Blu-ray 3D, Blu-ray, DVD and Digital Copy of the movie. Release Date: 10 November 2009
'UP' Review
Superb work. Visually, UP is just as stunning. The digital 3D tech employed for this film is far from a gimmick - it enhances the experience of the film by multitudes. When Carl and Russell are walking over cliffs or trekking through gorgeously rendered South American jungles, with an enormous floating 3D house harnessed to their backs, it's ...
Up
Up is playing in theaters in both 3D and standard 2D. I saw the 2D version for this review and you can read an in depth review of Up 3D from Cinema Blend's Katey Rich right here. Maybe the 3D ...
(Film Review) UP: The Power of Now for New & Old Adventures
FILM REVIEW: UP, Disney Pixar film 2009. Preview here. Last week I saw (from the first row, and in 3-D) Disney Pixar's Up , an animated film about life, adventure, and friendship. The film certainly pulled on my heart strings in a very "other-people-matter" positive-psychology way. The film also speaks to this month's theme of fun and play.
Up Movie Reviews
By tying thousands of balloon to his home, 78-year-old Carl Fredricksen sets out to fulfill his lifelong dream to see the wilds of South America. Right after lifting off, however, he learns he isn't alone on his journey, since Russell, a wilderness explorer 70 years his junior, has inadvertently become a stowaway on the trip.
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Up (United States, 2009) May 26, 2009. A movie review by James Berardinelli. A film like Up makes it clear that Pixar has moved beyond the point where it feels the need to pander to children. Unlike its main animation competitor, Dreamworks, Pixar allows sophisticated themes and ideas to seep into its movies.
Up (2009)
Muntz's character was quite frankly underdeveloped, shallow, and, moreover, controversial. In one scene, he is portrayed as a hero and a hospitable gentleman, but quickly changes in a Dr. Jekyll/Mr. Hyde fashion into a maddened, obsessed lunatic bent on capturing the bird without regard to even human life.
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It Ends with Us movie review & film summary (2024)
This story of love, trauma and abuse is wrapped up in the same amber-hued autumnal glow of Lively's bestie Taylor Swift's short film for her autobiographical song "All Too Well (10 Minute Version)," which itself is about an abusive relationship. Lily even has the same tousled strawberry blonde tresses as the short film's star Sadie Sink.So naturally, the film's most climatic moment of ...
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The Instigators review: Matt Damon and Casey Affleck pair up in the
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