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The tenth Pixar movie, "Up", has the honor of being the first animated picture ever to open a Cannes festival. Carl Fredricksen (voiced by Ed Asner) is a 78-year-old widower who has always longed to visit the mythical lost worlds of South America. When developers conspire to pack him off to a nursing home, he ties up thousands of balloons to the roof of his house and flies away to fulfill that dream. Alongside him, rather unexpectedly, is an 8-year-old Wilderness Explorer named Russell (Jordan Nagai), a peppy naïf who offsets his grousier temperament.

It's utterly delightful, certain to appeal to audiences young, old and all points in between. Cannes audiences are notoriously vocal. They'll whistle if they're unhappy -- a French version of a boo -- and a movie that doesn't meet the audience's high standards will be treated to the repeated "whop" sounds of theater seats banging shut as patrons leave. "Up," on the other hand, received little but cheers.

It's an unlikely film to be opening Cannes. Not only is it animated, it's animated by computer -- and, in some theaters, it will be shown in 3-D. Those are all firsts for a Cannes curtain raiser. Los Angeles Times' Kenneth Turan said he sees Pixar's work, and its recognition by Cannes, as another sign that animated features are among the best films being produced right now. "The Pixar films, the Hayao Miyazaki films from Japan, the Wallace and Gromit films from Britain -- we're really living in the golden age of animation, one of the great ages of animation in the whole history of film."

"There's a perception that animated films are for kids. A lot of people have that, which I think is very unfortunate. The films are made by adults who have very adult concerns," said Ed Catmull, president of Disney and Pixar's animation studios. "What happens now at Cannes is they're recognizing it as a film. Not as a category, but as a really great film." "Up" director Pete Docter said animation was a tool, not the star. "It's not a genre, it's a medium. Animation can do anything. If we decided to, we could do horror films or drama, suspense, anything," said Docter, who also made Pixar's "Monsters, Inc."

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Photos courtesy of Pixar Animation Studios & Walt Disney Pictures

Original Source: CNN (with photo gallery), Richmond Times-Dispatch, and Telegraph (with video)

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