FILM: Pixar’s Up is a tinsy bit manipulative, but you don’t care

Like its stablemate Wall-E, Pixar’s Up has two distinct elements – the beautifully melancholy and the borderline bonkers. Wall-E splits more easily down the middle, the first half being virtually silent and playing out across the ruins of Earth – the second a more cartoonish foray into outer space, onto a ship where humans have become bloated caricatures of the American obese.

As has been widely reported, the first 10 minutes of Up are beautiful, portraying the arc of a couple’s lives without sentimentality – and again, with little sound. The effect of this first section is more intense than its equivalent in Wall-E, as it has to form the emotional amchor for a considerably crazier adventure. This anchor – an old man’s regrets, learning to live again through a young boy’s enthusiasm – occasionally punctuates the rest of the story, but there’s something about the efficiency of those first ten minutes that feels manipulative. Not much, but a little – a bit like the end of Atonement.

Still, the details are so delightful that you barely care: Dug the talking dog, with his eager displays of affection for any human that crosses his path; Alpha with his misfiring vocal unit; Kevin the hapless tropical bird; the list is long. And of course it looks beautiful, which almost goes without saying for Pixar, but the fact that you can sit there and accept everything that happens speaks volumes to that (see Disney’s Tinker Bell And The Lost Treasure for comparison).

British Zac Efron ‘resisting Disney hunt’

The British Zac Efron was said to be in hiding today, defying attempts by the Walt Disney Company to find him. The organisation, which is looking for a new Efron to complement its faltering American breed, has stepped up its ‘search for a star’ in the country, but Mr Efron, 20, fears he will suffer the same fate as the ‘Irish Demi Lovato’.

Ms Lovato was snatched from her home last year, and has never been heard from again. Sources at Disney claim that the long-haired Celtic actress is alive and well, frolicking on a farm in Iowa – but Mr Efron remains unconvinced, offering a series of defensive barks when our reporters relayed Disney’s claims.

Actors rights groups claim that, while the glossy haired Efron breeds are immensely popular with cinemagoers, their treatment in Hollywood is unfair, with the creatures having to endure three months in quarantine before they can start work. During this stay they are visited by voice coaches and posture specialists to ensure their presentability. The organisations suggest that less camera shy breeds such as the Dustin Diamonds may be better suited to such a life, but audiences have shown little inclination to pay to see the breed – and in this business, money talks.