Powerful but uneven.

Rating: 5/10 (11 January 2012)

I have a history of generally avoiding animated films just due to a block that prevents me from investing in artificial characters, but I'd be lying if I said Up didn't touch me. Within the first half hour I was in a river of my own tears and there were several other times the film got me choked up. The relationship between Carl and Ellie was beautiful and sweet and whenever they pulled on those strings, wellit really worked for me.
It's unfortunate that the rest of the film wasn't that good. Instead, they mix in this beautiful and heartbreaking story of an elderly man all alone with a very dull and standard villain plot (disappointingly standard after the great uniqueness in his means of transportation) and the most annoying sidekick since Short Round. I admired the parallels between Carl and Russell and I got plenty of laughs out of this, but it wasn't exciting at all. For a relatively short film it dragged a lot, and the moments that it dragged were the ones that were supposed to be the most exciting. I couldn't have cared less about everything with Muntz and so the big action pieces had me zoning out frequently.
Up started off with a very somber, adult tone with the introduction to Carl that I really respected, but the more things they added onto it just made that tone a lot more muddled and awkward. They went for a lot of different tones and I don't think they pulled them together very well. Still, I have to admire it so some degree just by virtue of how much it pulled on my heart strings; there were a lot of tears and quite a few laughs. I just wish the good hadn't been bogged down by so much ordinary.