Up Up and Away!

Now, where to start with this one, the build from 5 years ago, that first image of Carl in his house, opening the door to the sky, silhouettes of the interior with a colourful outside. The first teaser with the house flying past and Carl on the porch, saying afternoon. The first time I saw the trailer in 1080 on my computer, the beauty of the balloons flying past, so colourful and wonderful. The introduction of Dug the Dog in a trailer "Squirrel!" everything was going so well.

Pete Docter being in charge, the man who went and did Monsters Inc, a film that pays in re-watches in comparison to the first time as a 10 year old, returns for a second Pixar film with this, a story about an old man who lives out the adventure he and his childhood friend/one true love always wanted to go on, as he floats away to South America with helium balloons from his stand at the zoo, not going to a retirement centre, just wanting to live out his days alone. But a big dumb wilderness guide kid manages to come along, making things a bit more hectic when involved with Dug the Dog and Kevin, this big mysterious bird, very funny too.

The start is amazing, it's uplifting, and then there's this montage of the two characters getting married, living their lives, going through infertility, and finally death, it's amazingly tearjerking. And it doesn't let up, there's like 5 times in the film where you could tell the crowd was really on the verge of tears, something a film rarely, if ever, manages to succeed and not look like some dull crybaby drama. The humour though is a winner too, sometimes shifting dramatically from the incredibly sad to the brilliantly hysteric. Sometimes the humor is a tad off, a little too broad, maybe just annoying and interrupting important parts.

The plot falls apart about 45 minutes in after the duo make it to South America and have to move over a large wealth of land, moving from the two to a whole bunch, ala WALL-E in the Axiom, but the group of dogs who talk don't work, making it feel like some crappy live action Disney flick, before the film we suffered a G-Force trailer, with Bill Nighy, Will Arnett and Tracey Morgan, the kind of cack kids eat up but doesn't work on anyone normal.

The baddie of the piece is given so little time to really be evil he just seems to be servicing the thin plot of the second half as opposed to having any real personality, original ideas or the like. The lack of originality seems to affect a lot of the film, there's great laughs and sad moments, interesting characters, but it's not Pixar being new and improved, it just feels like another Bolt, only far far superior of course. The limited voice actors creates a homely feel, only a select number, and the graphics are absolutely amazing, but not as mind blowing as last year's WALL-E, WALL-E was of course an ultimate Pixar film, but this cannot compare, it is shadowed by the former.

The music was average, it never had anything amazing to make you hum out of the cinema, the action sequences, whilst too many, especially one near the end being far too cartoony, are well done and intense, even though what was going to happen was incredibly predictable. It's a shame some elements are just flawed to bits, because if they had made them a tad better this film would have been an absolutely brilliant Pixar on form film, still, it's better than Cars and Finding Nemo, it's like A Bugs Life, it's good, but it's not what it could have been.

Also the 3-D Pixar logo is disappointing, I like the static image of the text, now they move around to make it 3-D, it doesn't work.

9/10