Up.

Again, a Pixar movie that I almost let pass me by.
My excuse, here, could have been "Wall-E was so good, they can't do that twice in a row". Not that they haven't done that in the past, mind you (Toy Story 2, Monsters Inc. for me). So well yes they can.

When it took 1/2 of Wall-E to make me shed a tear, it took Up only 10min. Just for this opening, presenting a perfect life in little moments, the movie could just be the best of the year. Simply amazing. And although the movie kind of climaxes emotionally here, the rest always manages to juxtapose extremely serious scenes with pure Tex Avery-style slapstick. Cry & laugh are just seconds of one another. It's a very difficult balancing act but they just manage to pull it off easily.
And with that tone set right, you can just have a stupid bird called Kevin, talking dogs, it's fine, it all works. It's all funny, well paced, well used (no fart joke here).
And the action packed final could stand amongst the best "summer blockbusters" scene of the year.

You could argue that on the whole it's yet another buddy movie with a mismatched pair of characters and it's true that the movie does follow the blue prints of the genre. Yet, the context, the themes change everything in my view.
Because at its heart, Up is finally a fairly children-unfriendly film. Loss, nostalgia, all these are difficult to empathise with if you haven't lived a little.
But as such, I don't care, I'm an old git already, screw the kiddies. :p

Another stand out for me here was that it was the 1st movie I watched in 3D. Initially I wanted to refrain myself until Avatar comes out, in order not to spoil anything of the experience that it promises.
But with Up available in 3D, how could I say no? And having seen it, I'm actually glad that I did. Because it's not a "3D effect" movie with lots of "in your face" moments. So it was very interesting to see how 3D can enhance a "standard" picture. Because it does. It gives real depth to the picture, which is stupid to say because that's exactly what 3D does, but the addition is really striking.
That final action scene just gives vertigo as a consequence. I can't imagine what a Spiderman movie could do with this...

So yeah another addition to the great movies I've seen this year. What a year indeed...