Update: The dogs in Up have made me "kind of like" dogs. This is huge! Dogs typically freak me out, especially mean dogs and particularly mean animated dogs. I was probably okay with the Up dogs because, thanks to implants that allowed their thoughts to be translated into English, they behaved a bit more like robots than like dogs. Press play below. "I have just met you, and I love you!" Exactly. SQUIRREL!
Now I can't decide: Would I rather have a dog who speaks like a robot, or a speaking robot who bears the general shape of a dog but is composed of metal? Robot dog or dog robot? I think robot dog! Progress, people. One day, I will not be afraid of dogs. I just have to go see more Disney movies. In 3-D.
Side note: Yay or nay on 3-D glasses during movies that make you cry? On the one hand: You look tough and impenetrable even if you're a simpering mess. On the other: Foggy, possibly misty, nasty-ass glasses that you have to clean, mid-scene, while still crying. Discuss.
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I LOVED the dogs in this movie, especially Alpha (though I won’t give away why to anyone who hasn’t seen it yet).
I thought the fact that they talked and their odd speech patterns were brilliant. (The fact that they could fly a plane…considerably less brilliant.)
As a dog lover, what I loved about the “Up” dogs was how realistic their behavior was. Dug? Is my dog, to a T. If my dog could express his thoughts, I think they would pretty much be along the lines of “I have just met you, and I love you” and “SQUIRREL” and the kind of admiration Dug expresses for his master. Whoever wrote the dogs’ roles clearly knows dogs extremely well. OK, they can’t fly airplanes, but suspension of disbelief was pretty key to liking the movie in general.
RedDog-
I get the concept of suspension of disbelief (I mean, hello…this IS a movie with talking dogs and a flying house). Still, for some reason or another, I’m fine with the dogs speaking and serving food, but watching them pilot planes was too much for me. Go figure.
A note about the 3-D glasses.
I took a girl to see this movie on a date. Now, I’m a guy. Not to be too stereotypical, but I like to thiink of myself as a “guy guy.” I change my own oil and drink whiskey and have been known to yell explatives at highly paid athletes for no good reason. But every time Carl brought out Ellie’s old Adventure Book, I swear, I was crying like a baby. I mean, actual tears. It was kind of uncontollable.
But the girl had no idea, thanks to the 3D glasses. I looked collected and just as cool as…well, everybody else in the theatre, which is, let’s admit it, kind of silly. But NO VISIBLE TEARS, thank God.
Perhaps this whole “3-D” gambit Pixar’s foraging into is just to help us guys out. Salvage our masculinity in these situations. I mean, I pretty much lost it at the end of Wall-E, too, and it was pretty…awkward.
The dogs were the favorite part of the movie for my kids. “Squirrel!” and “Point!” and “I have just met you and I love you!” have been heard around my house all week. Great movie!
Ceballos – I was crying in a fit of laughter at Alpha! I agree, I loved the dogs! XD
I loved when they all had their heads out the window! But dogs who can cook? Nah, didn’t believe it for a minute. Squirrel!
Anyone who doesn’t like dogs, especially Doug, should wear the Cone of Shame.
I admit that talking animals feels like a desperate gimmick in the ‘CGI film’ playbook, but how Up used it was refreshingly clever and hilarious to boot.
I agree that the dogs flying bi-planes was pretty strange, but complaining about it in a movie with a floating house would be nitpicking too much.
Brandon: a guy sniffling at the sight of the adventure book (and at the end of Wall-E) is just plain sexy. Besides, if your date was a human being, she was probably too busy crying herself to notice.
Good grief – if I had to deal with 3D glasses along with the CONSTANT FLOW OF TEARS that started with the animated short….well, the glasses wouldn’t have been much use, because they would have been off the entire time.
I was hiding under your porch because I love you
The talking dogs were the perfect balance of humor to the heavier emotions behind this film! And yes, 3d glasses are a bad idea for sad movies. The best part about the film are the deeper meaning behind the film! This flick has layers! I wrote a blog about the symbolism of the house here: http://www.conversantlife.com/jimfarmer – check it out and let me know what YOU think!
I still don’t know about the crying in 3D glasses, I think it made me look more wimpy because I already wear glasses and had to wear the 3D glasses on top of that! (sorry but no way on Earth am I going to be sticking things to my eyeballs!) but I didn’t care, I just had to go for the pretending to be scratching the cheek move.
Oh yeah, the dogs ruled!