Boom shacka lacka (Pixar takes you higher)

Rating: 10/10 (2 June 2009)

With their latest installment "Up," Pixar once again--with canny skill--makes the consistently most entertaining, dazzling films that fall into the category of "family" entertainment.
"Up" is yet another advance in both the skill of animation as well as story-telling but with a maturing respect for its audience. While this doesn't make you as deliriously giddy as "Finding Nemo" or "Wall*e," it takes a more traditional story arc and reaps the benefits of a more satisfying catharsis.
While we get talking dogs, the primary characters here are human and therefore ones we fully accept and also know. Their perils--physical and emotional--are rendered fully and will provoke a mature, adult response. There's nothing here as violent as anything in the Indiana Jones franchise, but parents have complained (wrongly, I feel) that the content is too strong for six or seven year olds. However, it is not the pap that Disney is known for.
Again, greater advances in technical digital effects and animation abound. Specfically the pull of and resistance to gravity on characters is impressive. I saw the 3D version, and the depth that's achieved, particularly in any of the aeriel sequences is astonishing.
Was it my favorite Pixar? It's like asking who is your favorite child. You may have one, but it's rude to verbalize any preference.