Up

How do you celebrate your 21 year old returning home for a few days for spring break? Well after going out to dinner at The Tasting Room, our neighborhood favorite, Piers, Peter and I (all adults) enjoyed the Disney animated movie, Up by Pixar. We loved it. You’re never too old to watch a movie like this. It was funny, with clever wit, had an interesting story line with a masterful unspoken time line in the beginning and the animation is phenomenal. “Even better than a non animated movie,” Piers noted, probably because we were watching it in HD, which I have to say, makes all the difference. (These stills are screen captures so do not reflect the definition.)

I’ve been fascinated with Pixar since they came on the scene. I haven’t seen all their movies but Toy Story was fabulous — so clever in dialogue and animated artwork.

Here’s a great link to learn about Pixar’s creative process. It’s amazing to me that each film takes about 4 – 6 years, way more time than a traditional, non-animated movie. So, in someways, although animation gets the kiddie quotient, it should get the respect it deserves — at least the adults in my household appreciate this film format. Here are previous posts on animation.

Note: At the time of writing this post, little was I aware that Up was up (no pun intended) for an Academy Award for Best Animated feature, and was the favorite to win, as well as being nominated for Best Picture — first time for an animated film to be in this category.

Since, we’re back on the Oscar’s, I just happened to find this link on last year’s nominees’ creative process  in their roles for Best Male Actor 2008. I always find this type of information insightful.