Film Review - Up

By Maria Teresa Nicotri (Level 4)

Up is an animation film and it was written and directed by Pete Docter and Bob Peterson. The film had five Oscar nominations (also for best movie) and it won two Oscars in 2010 for best animation and best soundtrack.

The film is set between USA and South America (Venezuela) and it is developed in a time frame of about seventy years. The story is narrated from Carl Fredricksen’s point of view.

The film narrates Carl Fredricksen life, starting from the main encounter of his life, in other words from the day when he meets Elly for the first time. A few years later, Elly become his wife. He shares with his wife the spirit of adventure and they daydream about a trip to Paradise Falls for several years, but they will never visit this amazing place together, in fact Elly becomes ill and dies the day in which Carl buys  flight tickets for Venezuela. After Elly’s death Carl is very sad and unsociable and he has a problem with justice and he is condemned to go to a retirement home, so he decided  to escape using thousands of helium balloons to lift off his home. He is going to live a fantastic adventure and thanks to a young Wilderness Explorer, that becomes his friend, he understands that there isn’t the adventure of a lifetime but life is an adventure itself.

I strongly recommend Up, because it is a family movie and it has different reading levels. It inoculates the spirit of adventure in children and it makes adults think about life chances. It is touching and amusing at the same time.