Up News

Kirby reviews Disney / Pixar's recent Blu-Ray releases of Up and Monsters, Inc. . Toon Talk: Disney Film and DVD Reviews by Kirby C. Holt Up and Monsters, Inc.

Welcome to the Blade blog Culture Shock, a three-times-a-week riff by Pop Culture Editor Kirk Baird on pop culture news, events, and trends.

Up: Before there was the little boy in the balloon hoax, the peeps at Pixar put a little boy in a flying house - alongside a curmudgeonly old man with one dream: to attach enough balloons to his home, so he can fly away to Paradise Falls, the most beautiful place in the world.

Around the time Mr. Fredricksen's old Victorian house was being dragged along the side of a Hindenburg-era dirigible, I realized that Pixar had turned the controls over to a bunch of card-carrying surrealists.

New and notable on DVD this week: 'Up' : This year's animated wonder from Pixar followed the adventures of a little boy and a man in his 70s and as they flew in a house lifted by balloons to the jungles of South America.

The Best Animated Feature Category is fairly new to the Academy Awards, being introduced only seven years ago back in 2002.

In a recent junket, Pete Docter and Bob Peterson answered questions regarding the film, their experiences and inspirations.

The animated film Up, directed by Pete Docter and Bob Peterson, features Kevin, Russell, Dug and Carl Fredricksen.

New DVD releases for Tuesday, Nov. 10, include "Up," "Enlighten Up!" and "The Ugly Truth." New DVDs Need a lift? Pixar's "Up" comes out on DVD today.

Published: Friday, November 13, 2009 at 12:40 p.m. Last Modified: Friday, November 13, 2009 at 12:40 p.m. It's almost axiomatic to say that Pixar movies are just as enjoyable for adults as they are for kids.

Let's be honest: kids like almost any movie that's aimed at them, no matter how wretched the acting or recycled the plot.

PIXAR'S latest - and greatest - is a very special piece of work, a deliriously enjoyable yarn that packs a considerable emotional wallop.

NO MORE EXCUSES. With Oscar's best-picture category expanded to 10, "Up" has to be there.

"UP" Animated/Family Directed by: Pete Docter & Bob Peterson DVD/Blu-Ray release date: November 10th, 2009 Reviewed by: Chess Hubbard Grade: Pixar has done it again.

When an expanded list of 10 movies competes next year for the best picture Oscar, director Pete Docter hopes his "Up" will become the first animated film since 1991's "Beauty and the Beast" to vie for Hollywood's most coveted honor.

The dramatic expansion of the best picture category at the Oscars may benefit films such as Up, the latest Pixar animation.

Pixar and Walt Disney Home Entertainment recently hosted an online virtual roundtable with Up writer/director Pete Docter and co-director/writer Bob Peterson.

For sheer exhilaration, no movie this year has topped Pixar's latest masterpiece, "Up." The animated movie rides viewers' emotions like a hot-air balloon drifting along with the shifting winds.

Pixar films aren't known for the "auteur theory", where the director is the most important person in the making of the film.

Dug the Talking Dog was one of the best parts of Up . Any dog lover in the audience couldn't help but fall for Dug's enthusiasm and the fact that his interior monologue matched exactly with what we've always suspected our four-legged friends were thinking all along.