I found the film "Up" to be funny and chalked full of excitement . It was a great movie to watch with my children.

Rating: 7/10 (6 February 2011)

The movie "Up" is a 2009 Walt Disney film about a retired balloon salesman, Carl Fredrickson who is in his 70's living his deceased wife Ellie's childhood dream of adventure to South America. Carl is a funny little man who adored his life with his wife Ellie who he met as a child. After Ellie's death and the court's decision to send Carl to a retirement home, he decides to fulfill Ellie's dream of living on Paradise Falls in South America. Carl fills thousands of balloons with helium and ties them to his house in order to take the house to Paradise Falls. Along the way he realizes that he has another passenger, an eight year old wilderness explorer named Russell. This unlikely duo get off to a rocky start but through meeting new friends like Kevin the bird and Dug the dog they become like father and son. The theme of this film is about life, love, and adventure. In the beginning we see Carl and Ellie's life together up until her death when they are old. We also see the love that they shared. Throughout the rest of the film we see the adventure that Carl takes to live the adventure that Ellie had wanted herself. Towards the end of the film when Carl sits down and looks through the adventure book one last time he realized that Ellie had lived an adventure of her own and was happy with their life together. The film as a whole focused on an old man's dream of fulfilling an adventurous past. Each scene of the film offered a bit of imagination and suspense. When Carl finally reaches Paradise Falls with his house he quickly realizes that his adventure is just beginning. After coming in contact with Kevin the bright colored unusual bird and the talking dog dug the pace of the movie picks up to an action based plot. Carl is torn between saving his house and saving Kevin from his childhood hero. The film was bright in its color format and used very deep but brilliant lighting to enhance the characters themselves. The camera gave different angle shots on specific scenes to keep you in suspense. For example, the scene where the dogs were chasing what appeared to be a very large bird. I found this film to be very mature and more of a young adult type than of a children's style of film. I felt that the film gave a sense of sadness and reality.