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JERRY BECK
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AMID AMIDI
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Pixar’s Up Trailer
by amid
November 7, 2008 2:49 pm


Pixar released the trailer for Pete Docter’s Up today. Looks promising.

11/7/08  3:03pm
Niffiwan says:

That was absolutely hilarious!

I am really looking forward to this film now.

11/7/08  3:16pm
Chuck R. says:

That’s their best “legacy montage” yet. You got to give Pixar the “humility in advertising” award. They have the longest string of nonstop hits in cinematic history. “Pixar” has been a household name for over a decade now. Yet they still start every trailer with “hey, remember us —we’re the guys that gave you Bugs Life!” :)

I like the shot of the little girl looking out the window as the huge house goes by. I’m waiting for— “Mommy….where’s my sooper suit?!”

I love Pixar films with people. I’m buying my ticket now.

11/7/08  3:47pm
Cyber Fox says:

Looks Promising

I hoping it will make up for the depressing and highly-preachy dystopian film “WALL-E”

11/7/08  3:55pm
revned says:

Aaaand it’s no longer available. Well (expletive).

11/7/08  3:58pm

I love it - though I’m a bit concerned that, outside of the main characters, Pixar’s house style for human figures is beginning to fall into a bit of a stock design… it’s still worlds ahead of the stiff marionettes from other studios that don’t show much attention to proportion, but like the restaurant patron in Ratatouille, I want to see something new. However, I have full confidence that the film on the whole will be marvelous.

11/7/08  4:03pm
Roberto says:

I love it. Humour, sense of wonder and an unusual cast of characters. Not to mention my fave Pixar film so far was also directed by Pete Docter. The designs are similar to other Pixar humans, but the main characters look quite unique and expressive.

11/7/08  4:29pm
Saturnome says:

The only thing I can add for now is that this looks fresh, exciting, and pixar (as an adjective for quality in animation).

11/7/08  4:29pm
Jake says:

WOW! The production design by Ricky Nierva looks AMAZING!!

11/7/08  4:52pm
Dan says:

Can’t wait! It’s like the primaries all over again. Why do we get teased for so long-WHY? I can’t help thinking about Pete Doctor’s student film. Pete, was that the genesis?…(is that a cricket chirping I hear?)

11/7/08  4:54pm
Kyle Maloney says:

11/7/08  4:57pm
Andrew says:

“We’re sorry. This video is no longer available.”

11/7/08  5:12pm
SlappyHappy says:

crap, it was taken down….

11/7/08  5:26pm
Music says:

here’s another link to it:
http://pixarplanet.com/blog/first-up-trailer-arrives

do any of you nerds know what movie the music they use in there is from?

11/7/08  5:40pm

Like Nicholas, I’m also noticing that Tony Fucile’s style now seems to be Pixar’s default human template.

Yeah, Pixar, I think you can stop the ‘Let’s recap ALL OUR MOVIES’ shtick, now….
Maybe it’s to remind people that the Disney brand still has two distinct CG divisions. God knows why.

11/7/08  6:23pm

I didn’t watch it only because I’ll have more fun at the movie knowing nothing about it. Wall-E was rather neutralized for me by seeing too much in the trailers.

11/7/08  7:24pm
Annie-Mae says:

Well I see some Howl’s Moving Castle inspiration in this. Great character designs. The other random people look a little down played (like filler characters from Incredibles) but the designs for our heroes are good enough to enjoy watching them for most of the film. I’m glad to see more of the look of the film, it was hard to imagine with little they gave us already, but once again this looks good.

11/7/08  8:13pm
Mr. Semaj says:

Youtube: “Sorry to get your hopes UP, but we’re gonna take this awesome trailer DOWN.

Losers.” [/devilhorns]

11/7/08  9:07pm
Wm C.Wallace says:

Anyone see similarities between this and Winsor McCay’s “Flying House” short from 1921?A man turns his house into an airplane.At least the central idea for “Up”came from one of the best……..to be sure,a dream come true! Wouldn’t McCay be amazed at how far animation has come in a hundred years! Life imitates art…….or is it visa-versa?

11/7/08  9:17pm
Markus says:

This looks very “Miyazaki” :)

11/7/08  11:19pm
Brett says:

I guess I’ll be the party pooper here, and say that I think the designs are somewhere between uninspired (the secondary humans), and flat-out ugly (main character). The old man is the ultimate triumph of Fucile-ism over actual appeal.

The boy scout is ok, but typically Pixar-ish.

I count out Pixar at my peril, given their track record. I’m sure the story will be solid, and the movie will be wonderful. But make no mistake, cracks are starting to show at Pixar. Wall-E was their first very seriously flawed movie. They are capable of failure.

Frankly, Bolt looks more interesting.

11/7/08  11:44pm
Michael says:

I’m going to go against the grain on this on. While they trailer was certainly funny, and the shot of the little girl in her room was amazing, I have to say on the whole I’m disappointed with it. There doesn’t seem to be anything unique to Up. Each one of Pixar’s previous films had a unique look and feel to it. Up just seems like leftovers from The Incredibles. The humans don’t even look as good as they did in Ratatouille. And none of the animation jumps out at me the way Remy’s scurrying, Linguini’s clumsiness, or Wall-e’s innocence did. All the characters, animation, and visual look of the film look extremely generic to me. Really the only thing that seems unique about Up to me is that it’s starring an old man, but Miyazaki already did that Howl’s Moving Castle (which was itself a big disappointment).

11/8/08  12:03am

Just click on the video and you’ll get a .mov file of the trailer. It’s pretty slick looking.

11/8/08  12:06am

People still tell me “Monsters, Inc.” was their favorite Pixar film. That’s nice to hear especially since that film was made some years ago.

Pete Docter and Bob Peterson are great guys to work with. I enjoyed my time on that show, and looking forward to this one.

11/8/08  1:32am
Luke R says:

After seeing the first stills and character designs I loaded up this trailer in the mindset that the film wouldn’t appeal to me. By the end of trailer I was thoroughly charmed! Pixar animators have the most delicious sensibilities when it comes to understated animation, the scout boys lips synch for example was lovely.

Anyone else think this looks a bit miyazaki influenced? I hope so :)

Cheers

11/8/08  9:42am
Richard Gadd says:

Really looking forwards to this one.

11/8/08  10:20am

Looks like lots of fun! And just because they don’t push the design envelope, doesn’t mean they aren’t pushing the story and animation to new heights.

11/8/08  10:42am
Jay Taylor says:

Well…

I have to agree with Brett and Michael. This looks really generic to me. I’ve slowly been losing interest in Pixar, and this isn’t helping things.

11/8/08  10:58am
tom Stazer says:

Not enough here to even get a feel for the story, so I can’t get too excited. Nice character design, I guess. Tired of the funny-because-they’re-short design, though, sheesh. This one is gonna depend on script, and at this stage there is no clue what that is like.

11/8/08  10:59am

I’m happy for Pixar that they’re breaking out of the mold of the secret life of toys/bugs/monsters/fish/superheroes/automobiles/etc. that are funny because they’re just like us. Now if they could develop a fresher sense of humour (Frantic! Long pause before the punchline!), that’d be even better. At least with things like “Up” and “Carter of Mars”, it looks like Pixar is beginning to feel comfortable with the idea of moving beyond their established formula.

11/8/08  11:09am
Roberto says:

Come on! I’d also like to see a little more experimentation in CGI human designs, but this is like saying Ratatouille had no interest because the humans were not too different to those in The Incredibles. Or Beauty and the Beast being boring cause Belle didn’t look too different to Ariel.

Here we have two main characters that are quite well designed and look fun and cute in their own way (yep, even the old man looks kind of a cute, in a “Mr. Magoo” way) and a concept that looks pretty new and original for an occidental movie. What’s not to like ?

11/8/08  11:59am

One thing they neglect to mention in the trailer is that all Pixar films are Disney films. Pixar has never made a feature without Disney. Also, Pixar now IS Disney.

I don’t see the need for the Pixar pep rally in the trailer to promote another Disney film.

I like the trailer (minus the tooting of horns intro), and the gag with the kid waiting to come in had great timing.

11/8/08  12:54pm
Chuck R. says:

full confession: I was half serious when I made the comment about the legacy montage. Even though Pixar’s work is well-known, I can see why they would want to keep their canon isolated from Disney’s CG fare (ie, Chicken Little, Dinosaurs). Pixar appeals to a different demographic, and now that they are working under the same roof, it will be harder to establish that point-of-difference.

11/8/08  5:19pm

Floyd: I don’t think it matters if Disney owns Pixar or if it’s financially independent, Pixar makes its own films. Just like Brad Bird deserves the credit for his films, Pixar deserves the credit for what it puts out of its own studio.

11/8/08  5:22pm

Also, this is precisely the same reason Space Chimps was advertised “from the makers of Shrek.” It’s not stretching things to say Pixar made all of the above, especially when other companies advertise their meager staff connections to blockbusters they likely had little to do with.

11/8/08  5:31pm
Reader A says:

“Pixar appeals to a different demographic, and now that they are working under the same roof, it will be harder to establish that point-of-difference.

I have to make a couple of factual corrections here:

Disney and Pixar are absolutely appealing to the exact. same. demographic: to entertain ALL audiences. To make GREAT movies. Period.
Whether anyone thinks they achieve that at either place is for audiences and critics and history to decide, but the aims are the same as is the job that the employees do–story, animation, lighting, etc. Many people have worked at both places at one time or another–that’s the way of the industry. But as far as “keeping their canon isolated”, well, they’ve always made their own movies at Pixar, naturally. They still do. So has Disney Animation in Burbank(and previously Burbank/Florida/Paris). The new Disney releases are no more “Pixar” films than the upcoming Pixar films are “Disney”, although technically they’re owned by the same corporation.

And secondly they are not “under the same roof” at all but are a 6 hour drive and hundreds of miles apart. They do not share employees. They do have the same ultimate boss, but he splits his time between the two separate studios.

11/8/08  5:44pm
Dave says:

I couldn’t be more excited - super enticing already!

11/8/08  6:04pm
Olve says:

11/8/08  6:29pm

Disney has had a lot of input on the Pixar films, beside the money used to make the films (especially at first), they have also had story input. They also distributed all of the Pixar films. While this may not seem like a big deal, the Pixar of today would not exist in it’s current form without Disney.

The trailer does actually mention “Disney Pixar”, so after listening to it again, this is a mute point.

The reason it’s a big deal in my mind is that Lasseter and Catmull run Disney Animation now, and Disney owns Pixar. They are the same company, yet from the top down, there continues to be this wedge driven between them. This doesn’t do either crew any good, and only helps to foster animosity toward Pixar from the Burbank crew. Now maybe that is all in people’s minds, but this trailer doesn’t do anything to say otherwise.

I just don’t see the point for the montage of “Pixar only” films.

11/8/08  7:24pm
PorkyMills says:

The trailer didn’t do anything for me, but the Monsters Inc. was the second best movie from Pixar, so I am certain it will be better than their offerings.

11/9/08  3:28am
Matt Sullivan says:

I like it. :}

C’mon guys. it’s Pixar! Even their worst is better than most other studios features.

I’ll be first in line! Hell, I’ll make a passionate plea. HEY PIXAR! INVITE ME TO AN EARLY SCREENING! I wanna seeeeeeeeeee!

*joy* :}

11/9/08  6:22am
Chiskop says:

Wow, besides the self back-patting from pixar. i kinda like this movie. but i won’t be going to the cinema to see it though. but seeing it in real 3D sounds enticing. Who knows? maybe i will, even though i am tired of pixar movies and thousands of its blind followers.

11/9/08  12:05pm
Vvek says:

am i the only one, who think the acting was way too cliche’ to be pixar ??

11/9/08  8:17pm
david says:

haahhahaa. Boy i am really sick of seeing lifeless bland 3D designs and like Vvek says, super cliched acting. Thanks JK, Thanks Lasseter. Its like they are proud of perpetuation mediocrity. Hmmm. Interesting.

11/10/08  12:05am
T M says:

Yesss! I’ve been the most excited about this movie since before Ratatouille! I love Ratatouille and Wall-E, but I feel UP is where it’s at!

11/10/08  9:34am
Chris J says:

Speaking from the perspective of someone who is not in the animation industry but considers himself a a fairly educated animation fan - I think the design here looks great. Good character design should tell you almost everything you need to know about the character in one glance. That shot of the main character opening the door does it in spades. Pixar has been very good at avoiding the trap of overdesigning their characters, UP appears to be no exception.

All too often when I visit the websites of artists who are railing against the “bland” design sensibilities of mainstream 3D and 2D movies, I see design after design that are unique, yes, but also usually repulsive. Sorry, but if you’re idea of good character design is to simply look at what’s mainstream and then do the opposite, you’re no better than those who simply imitate what works.

11/10/08  2:04pm

There’s definitely a Howl’s Moving Castle homage going on. But I’m excited!

“People still tell me “Monsters, Inc.” was their favorite Pixar film. That’s nice to hear especially since that film was made some years ago.”

It’s still my favorite of the Pixar films too! :)

11/10/08  10:51pm
Markus says:

Yep, you immediately know a lot about these characters just by their design , Character design should be another way to tell the story.

A square head character says a lot about his personality….

11/11/08  12:35am
Matt Sullivan says:

How many times are we going to have this discussion. Let’s see the film first!

11/11/08  7:58am
Chris J says:

Markus,

I know the trees are distracting, but there’s actually an entire forest here . . . really.

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