Up (Five-Disc Combo: Blu-ray 3D/ Blu-ray/ DVD + Digital Copy) (2009)

Someday, Pixar is going to do it -they're going to create an emotionally uninspiring, lackluster animated movie. But in the meantime, they're still putting out delightful animated movies like "Up," which defies the usual kid-movie conventions by starring a crotchety old man. It's a charming, fun little adventure story with flying dogs and balloon-powered houses, but underlying it is a bittersweet little story about loss and love.

As a child, the shy Carl Fredricksen bonded with the oddball Ellie over their shared love of adventure, the explorer Charles Muntz, and Paradise Falls. They later married, move into their "clubhouse" together, and lived a long, sadly childless life together. When Ellie died, she had never fulfilled her dream of going to Paradise Falls.

Now crotchety, alone and harassed by a real estate developer, Carl (Ed Asner) is finally ordered to a retirement home. But he isn't going quietly -instead he attaches thousands of balloons to his house and floats it away toward South America. But he accidentally takes an enthusiastic, naive Wilderness Explorer (a thinly-veiled Boy Scout) named Russell (Jordan Nagai) along for the ride. Poor kid was just trying to earn an "assisting the elderly" badge.

And the jungle trek to Paradise Falls turns out to have some surprising obstacles: a big emulike bird that Russell names Kevin, a talking dog named Dug ("I am jumping on you, bird!"), and a mysterious old man who lives deep in the heart of the jungle. Turns out the old guy is very familiar to Carl -and to capture Kevin, he's willing to sacrifice Carl and Russell.

Industry experts were babbling about how "Up" wouldn't be as popular as the previous Pixar movies, because the protagonist is basically a crusty old coot. Well, shows what they know. It ended up becoming one of those classic movies that somehow appeals to all ages -while the humor and action appeal to children, adults can appreciate Carl's love for his lost wife, and his slow realization that he's clinging to the past.

In fact, the first ten minutes are some of the most heart-tugging, quietly bittersweet scenes I've seen in a long time. Without a word, they show all the ups and downs of a realistic marriage -joys, sorrows (Ellie's inability to have children), growing old together, and finally loss.

But it's not a depressing movie by any stretch -in fact, it's like a childhood fantasy come to life, complete with a floating house suspended on hundreds of balloons, and biplanes piloted by a talking dog army.. Plenty of great dialogue ("Do you want to play a game? It's called See Who Can Go the Longest Without Saying Anything." "Cool! My mom loves that game!") and an action-packed climax in an aged airship.

Ed Asner is absolutely perfect as ubergrouch Carl -crotchety, grumpy, and determined to fulfill his wife's lifelong dream, but gradually realizing he's clinging to the past. Nagai is equally perfect as Carl's polar opposite: a naive, chattery Scout who is determined to reunite Kevin with her baby chicks. And the utterly adorable Dug and the other dogs deserve special notice. These creatures are utterly hilarious -they talk ("I hid under your porch because I love you") and act the way dogs would if they talked. Three words: cone of shame.

The two-disc edition is going to have some very nice extras, but once again people with regular-def DVDs are going to get shafted because the Blu-ray edition will have a bunch of exclusive stuff. Grr. As for this one, there's a digital copy, the director's audio commentary, kinda-alternate-ending "The Many Endings of Muntz," and the documentary "Adventure Is Out There" about the research for this movie.

There are also a pair of adorable animated shorts. "Partly Cloudy" has a much-abused stork having to deliver potentially harmful baby creatures from a kind but clueless cloud. And "Dug's Special Mission" is a sort of backstory for the adorable Dug, explaining what the heck he was doing before he met up with Carl and Russell.

"Up" continues Pixar's running tally of gloriously animated, emotionally layered movies that the entire family can enjoy. With that, I have only one more thing to say... SQUIRREL!

I had no expectations of being disappointed with a Disney/Pixar BD, and being that it took me a whole dedicated day to get through everything, I now feel it was worth every penny. The film was enjoyable, funny, sad, and scary filled with some nice messages about life and loss. I can understand why the majority of my customers loved it.

The Blu clarity is outstanding, and the amount of reference points are extensive, but one that stands out the most for contrast lines would have to be when the house is entering the lair (balloons against the dark cavern). The sound is selectable between 5.1 DTS, 2.0 DTS and Descriptive English. The 5.1 was beautiful with tons of reference points, sometimes excruciating (that bird screeching) but thorough nonetheless. Now for the supplements (all times in minutes):

DISC 1: (BD)

* 5:46 Partly Cloudy short film. Was hilarious. A great depth test for your display with the clouds. Nice little message of tolerance no matter how difficult someone might be.

* 4:40 Dug's Mission. An almost lo-def looking short take on our main dog dealing with the main three baddies on a chase.

* 22:17 Adventure Out There. A must see documentary about the crew taking the actual trip to the Tepui location in South America. A beautiful travel infomercial in itself. Loved how their guide only wore sandles for the ascent and hikes.

* 4:56 Alternate Scenes Ending of Muntz. Sketches and interviews regarding different endings for that bad guy that they had come up with.

* 1:00 How-to on using the Digital Copy.

* Cine Explore option while watching the film. The two directors give their commentary with multiple pop-up screens showing art, ideas, etc.

* Screen Saver. Allows you to set a time period for your screen saver to activate.

* Maximize Your Home Theater. The standard Pixar multi-step process for setting all of your theater capabilities.

DISC 2: (BD)

Documentaries

* 6:24 Geriatric Hero. History behind the creation of our old guy. All of these documentaries are interview oriented with sketches and film clips to supplement.

* 8:26 Canine Companions. In depth analysis on the breed choices, training and dog behavior studied to get the dogs in the film to be more dog like.

* 9:00 Russel Wild Explorer. Covers the reasons for his character to have the loss and why he was "egg" shaped as opposed to other sketch ideas.

* 5:04 Kevin (bird). Nice reference to the Swiss Family Robinson ostrich; covered the hardest part of any of these animation films the feathers.

* 4:38 Homemakers Pixar. Enjoyed the work that went into them studying sub-floors and lighting options in making this look so real in the house.

* 6:25 Balloons and Flight. Tells the now famous number of balloons used; some interesting dirigible history; shows the Pixar group using that local Bay Area air service I keep seeing fly around here (research stuff).

* 7:37 Composing for Characters. Have to be into the musical/scoring stuff for this one.

Extras

* Global Guardian Badge Game. After the initial setup of name, difficulty levels and tutorial material, the game has an extensive amount of country/geography material. Customers grouped around and we did fine for the United States section, but we randomly tried Africa and we bombed (some of the countries they were asking for I hadn't heard of in years) good learning tool though.

* 9:15 Alternate Scene Married Life. Another sketch/interview piece about more material being removed/added into that section of the film. The scene itself would have been only a minute longer.

* 6:00 montage. A mix of characters doing funny things will make the kids laugh.

* Screen Saver option.

DISC 3 (DVD)

* Film, plus special features from disc 1. WITH THE EXCEPTION of no Spanish subtitles/language; English only.

DISC 4 (Digital Copy).

* Code both unlocks the copy and gets you the usual points at the Disney site.

Overall, an excellent product no matter how you look at it. The case has that new single hinge, multi-page off center chassis that has proven to be less than durable, but it should suffice for low usage storage. Enjoy.

Buy Up (Five-Disc Combo: Blu-ray 3D/ Blu-ray/ DVD + Digital Copy) (2009) Now

Another commendable, 4-star outing from Pixar.

The DVD packaging is another matter. There have been many complaints about the computer-incompatibility, but my gripe is about the "pecking order" for those that want the single-disc DVD vs. the 4-disc Blu-ray and everything in-between.

Time was when you bought a 2-disc set of a Pixar film, you got hours worth of neat, entertaining and enlightening extras (example: the exhaustive Super Heroes guide with "The Incredibles"). By the time "Cars" came out, you could only get a single-disc version with very few extras. "Ratatouille": same story. "Wall-E" somewhat rectified the situation with the available 3-disc version, which did have generous bonuses if you shelled out the bucks, that is. "Up" has the most deceptive packaging of all: a bare-bones single-disc version (you just want the movie and a lot of promos? You got it!), the "deluxe" DVD version (which Amazon/Disney advertise as a "Two-Disc Deluxe Edition + Digital Copy", which can imply there are three discs [there are not], and there are certainly NOT "hours of new bonus! [sic]", as the slip-sleeve boasts), and a 4-disc Blu-ray version for those fortunate enough to own that format. Disney is obviously hard-balling the recession-weary public into buying Blu-ray players and their inflated-priced discs and punishing those who are scraping by with an archaic DVD.

What would have been nice is an extras-packed double-DVD w/o the digital copy (I don't know anybody who really uses this), a better-valued single-DVD version and maybe even a single-Blu-ray.

The release date for a Pixar movie used to be an event. Now it's a downer, waiting to see how Disney rips its faithful public off again.

Read Best Reviews of Up (Five-Disc Combo: Blu-ray 3D/ Blu-ray/ DVD + Digital Copy) (2009) Here

It is a good movie, but my wife is Deaf and can not enjoy this movie yet again (since we saw it at the theater) Also our Deaf friends and their children are excluded. This is a real waste of money for us. The movie companies are getting greedier and greedier.. shame on you Disney.

**Today and email was in my box via the Disney store says "The box states that it has captions for the hearing impaired, spanish (etc) and closed caption."

Well, the box SAYS IT it must be true!??

(Tested on several systems)

WELL THEY STILL AIN'T WORKING!!

Want Up (Five-Disc Combo: Blu-ray 3D/ Blu-ray/ DVD + Digital Copy) (2009) Discount?

Grab your husband or significant other (after packing off the kids for a sleep over, if applicable), pour some F.A.B.s (frosty adult beverage) and snuggle up on the couch to watch UP! A wonderful, touching movie about a widower who takes pleasure in circumventing those who would have him move to Shady Acres nursing home and give up the home he and his wife, Ellie, made. Walter, our protagonist, is known as a crotchety old man. What most people don't know is that Walter is a lonely man since his wife and life-long love died. They never made their dream trip to Paradise Falls. Like most of us of a certain age, we plan and dream, hoping to fulfill that dream one day. One day never came for Ellie and Walter; but now that the powers that be think he should be in a retirement home, Walter has a Plan. Unfortunately, or perhaps fortunately, a young scout (Russell), trying to achieve a badge for Elderly Assistance, is caught up in Walter's plan to foil the well-meaning social worker.

This is a Disney/Pixar Studios film, so the images are just spectacular. I have seen the behind the scenes video (included on the discs) where the team of artists travels to Tepui in South America, the area Walter (& Russell) have their adventure. It's amazing how realistic the animation depicts the natural beauty of this area! I don't normally watch the "Extras" that come with a dvd, but in this case, made an exception and throughly enjoyed them. From the 3 shorts (including alternate endings) to the aforementioned trip by the artistic team to South America. Another disc is devoted to in depth behind the scenes and documentaries showing their studies of geriatrics to dog breeds. Everything very informative and not boring. The set also includes a digital copy of the movie Up (Four-Disc Blu-ray/DVD Combo + BD Live) [Blu-ray]. There is also a game (Global Guardian Badge game--a geography skills game that can be set for different skill levels), a 'deleted scene' piece on married life and a montage of stills (kinda a blooper reel feel) of various characters doing funny things/situations. Very funny stuff, especially for children.

All in all, this is a lush, amazing movie--both the story line as well as the animation. Characters are well developed and mostly (with one notable exception) likeable...especially the dog! Lots of life lessons included, par for Disney. A great way to spend a day or night (or both for all the discs!). Amazon has a GREAT PRICE on this set, better by far than any local stores. Combined with the awesome shipping and customer service, you cannot go wrong purchasing this Up set! Buy it today, schedule that one-on-one time with the love of YOUR life and another viewing with the family. Even my 76 year-old mother loved this movie. Make sure you buy Puffs Ultra Soft and Strong Facial Tissues, Family Boxes, 744-Count to have on hand for viewing, it is a quite touching, moving story of love and life! Highly recommended.

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