B.W. At The Movies: Up

Love makes us do astonishing, amazing things.

Things that surprise even us.

Things that push us past what we thought were our limits.

Things that are utterly, literally fantastic, i.e., things that exist only in the realm of fantasy.

Love ties us together; it makes us understand ourselves and how much we need each other.

With themes like that, Up qualifies as the most, er, uplifting story in many a year.

It's the story of an old man, his absent late wife, a young boy, a dog and a bird — and what they're willing to do for love. It's hysterically funny, heartbreaking and heartwarming.

It's made by the folks at Pixar, which has put out so many great stories that it must be considered the contemporary corporate home of master storytellers. Another home run into the next county.

And I always try to remember the short at the beginning of the evening; the Pixar folks remember how much fun it was to have a cartoon with Road Runner, Bugs Bunny or even Pepe LePew before the main feature. Partly Cloudy is a sweetly creative turn on the old myth that storks deliver babies — it probably started with the question, OK, if storks deliver babies, where do they get the babies from? As always, the short warms up the audience with a healthy dose of bellylaughs and sentiment, softening us up for the story of Carl, Ellie, Russell, Dug and Kevin.