There are films that begin with a story. Up begins with an entire life. In less than five minutes, Pixar tells us a love story that is also a story about time, desire, small losses, and the final blow. Carl and Ellie’s story is so profound that it needs no dialogue: only silences, gestures, shared routines. And, of course, the house: that space that, in environmental psychology, can be understood as the physical extension of the self. In Up, that house becomes literal: it is the past that Carl refuses to let go of. His memory. His floating grief.
Carl represents old age from an emotionally dense perspective. He is not just an older man; he is someone clinging to nostalgia, to «what could have been.» Grief, as Elisabeth Kübler-Ross proposes, has five stages: denial, anger, bargaining, depression, and acceptance. Carl, at the beginning of the film, is caught between denial and anger. He’s turned his house into a time capsule, and any attempt at change (the construction of buildings, workers knocking on his door, the passing of the world) is a direct threat to his emotional stability.
But then Russell arrives.
From the perspective of child developmental psychology, Russell is a child who needs to belong. His insistence on earning a badge isn’t just a concrete goal: it’s his way of seeking validation, affection, and connection. We know he doesn’t have a father figure present, and that behind his insistence on helping the elderly lies a deep need for guidance, a look, and a hug.
Vygotsky argued that learning occurs in the zone of proximal development, that is, in that intermediate space between what a child can do alone and what they can do with help. Interestingly, Up reverses this concept: it’s the child who helps the adult overcome their limits. It’s Russell who pushes Carl toward transformation. Because Carl isn’t just old. He’s stuck.
The balloon ride—that powerful visual metaphor—is also an internal journey. It’s a metaphor for the need to let go of the weight, to literally release objects in order to keep moving forward. The house flies, yes. But it gets lower and lower. Every memory, every object, every chair prevents Carl from moving forward. Until he finally understands: he doesn’t need to take everything with him to preserve what’s important. Memory isn’t in things. It’s in the connection.
And that album, «My Adventure Book,» is the most powerful psychological twist in the entire film. Carl believed he had failed Ellie, that they hadn’t fulfilled their dream of going to Paradise Falls. But Ellie had already written her ending. The important thing wasn’t the destination. It was the shared life. The daily adventures. The little things. From an existentialist perspective, this is a stroke of lucidity: it’s not about what we dream of doing, but how we live in the meantime.
Up is also a study of intergenerational bonds. Carl and Russell need each other. One represents experience, structure, the past. The other, spontaneity, emotion, openness to the present. Together they find a middle ground. One lets go. The other feels seen.
And of course, Up also has its «cookie crisis.» But here, it’s a crisis shaped like a mailbox. When Carl hits a worker for touching the mailbox he shared with Ellie, we understand that this isn’t a simple reaction: it’s a desperate cry to not lose what little remains of their love story. It’s when the past hurts so much that it turns into violence.
But the film teaches us that true love isn’t lost when we move forward. On the contrary. Only when we move forward can that love be transformed into a legacy, a bond, a new story.
Thus, Up isn’t a movie about flying. It’s a movie about learning to let go of what we no longer need, so that what truly matters can… lift us up.
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