Lifted

A remote farm-house (probably in the Midwest) is suddenly bathed in a bright, clean light and the sleeping farmer is picked up from his bed and carried towards the window, where an alien craft awaits. Unfortunately for him, the abduction is being undertaken by a trainee, who really needs more hours in the simulator before tried to do it on a live subject.

This short film was screened before the feature Ratatouille and worked well in getting the audience in the laughing mood. Like the equally good "For the Birds" this short film delivers constant laughs in a short time before bowing out with a strong finish. The former short focused on a big tall bird, this film focuses on a trainee alien but the approach is the same – have one weakness or failing be the subject of the short. Here the trainee cannot get the man out the window with the controls and the repeated failures are simple but also very funny. This continues to the end, which is a nice big laugh at the end. The animation is typical Pixar, very clean, professional and impressive with plenty of cultural references in the alien abduction itself for film fans.

Overall then a very clever and funny short film that works very well because it knows just what it needs to do and does it in a ruthlessly efficient manner.

Why are Pixars' movies so fantastic and attractive? Today I would like to talk about this movie, The main character is an alien. This movie shows Pixar's strong point. Pixar's strong point is computer graphic. There is slime character in this movie. It is like live-action. We can feel slimy from screen. It shows Pixar's skill. In this story, alien takes the test. However he is so nervous. He forgets how to operate spaceships. Do you have same experience? My answer is yes. May be many people has same experience. That's why we can sympathize with the main character. Moreover, his character is so cute and lovable. As we see the movie, we cheer him naturally. This is typical types of Pixar's character. Dory is a good example. She is a key character in Finding Nemo. She forgets everything momentously. If you have friends like her, you don't hold good feeling to her. Her lovable character doesn't do so. Pixar is good at making lovable characters. In conclusion, this movie's good point is skills and character. This is important part when we make movie. Pixar has skills of graphic. They also have good imagination. This is why they can make a good film.

This animated short is on the 2-Disc Special Edition of Ratatouille, and I understand that it was also played in theaters right before aforementioned feature was. With a running time of five minutes and not a single spoken word, this communicates entirely through the visuals, and the quality is definitely top-notch. The story-telling is quite good, and this doesn't go for the cheap audience-pleaser of just doing fancy stuff with the ever-expanding technology, and instead uses it. This has a cool enough, minimalistic plot that you can instantly get into, and a conflict that takes a mere second to wrap your head around, including for young children, in spite of the exact situation being one that I'm willing to bet no one in the audience has found themselves in. All of the sound is excellent, as is the use of it. I didn't personally find this terribly funny, but I can imagine that many will. The material tends to be physical, with slapstick and sight gags. Cartoon violence, and a brief image that might remind people of plumbers is the extent of the offensive material. I recommend this to fans of CGI movies. 7/10

Lifted (2006)

*** (out of 4)

Extremely entertaining and rather intelligent short from Pixar has a couple aliens landing their aircraft above a house where they try to beam up the man sleeping inside. The only problem is that the smallest alien is having trouble with all the controls and can't get him up to the ship. This short is certainly very high on the cute level as the two aliens look the part just right and the overall comedy never gets too high but instead just delivers a fun time. I thought the alien was the amazing looking shots of the UFO outside the out. I loved the way it looked with that incredibly bright light and I really loved the ending and what the ship looked like when it took off. I thought the two aliens looked very good and their comic timing together got plenty of nice, if small laughs. On the visual level this here is certainly one of the best looking shorts I've seen from the studio.

A sleeping human rests on his bed when a gigantic UFO appears and, hell-bent on it, attempts to take him away.

The animation sets the scene as something mysterious, something that the spectator is expecting to see in an UFO movie, which later on adds to the humorisity of it all when the alien keeps on trying to take the human away without success, making the viewer realise that this isn't a normal short.

There's no dialogue, but the visual storytelling (the expressions of the aliens, the circumstances in which the youn alien is in) is so great that it isn't needed. The constant mistakes of the alien and the absolute blank-face of his partner are hilarious, but the story has time to turn a little heartwarming before making the audience laugh again. The ending is truly the cherry on top of this humorous short.