Countdown to Up: 4 Days to Disney•Pixar’s 10th film

The Incredibles was Pixar’s first film with a cast of human main characters, albeit super heroes. The film achieves a visual style all it’s own that is unique and brilliant. The Incredibles has great action, a brilliant musical score and a good story. This is an animated masterpiece.

-John C.

The Incredibles Trivia*

• Jason Lee (Buddy/Syndrome) recorded his vocals in four days, while Craig T. Nelson (Bob Parr/Mr. Incredible) recorded his vocals over the span of two years

• Among the superheroes shown listed in the Kronos database are Universal Man, Psycwave, Everseer, Macroburst, Phylange, Blazestone, Downburst, Hyper Shock, Apogee, Blitzerman, Tradewind, Vectress, Gazerbeam, Stormicide, Gamma Jack, ElastiGirl, Frozone, and Mr. Incredible

• To record the Henry Mancini- and John Barry-inspired jazz-orchestra score, composer Michael Giacchino eschewed modern digital multi-track recording and returned to the analog recording methods used for jazz-orchestra recordings in the 1960s. "We were just like, 'Forget that, let's throw everyone in the room, let's pretend we only have three microphones, and let's get it right. Let's just do it"

• Mirage's toll-free phone number on her calling card is 866-787-7476, an unregistered phone number at the time of the movie's original release. However, when compared to the letters on a typical phone pad, the last seven digits spell out the word "suprhro". The phone number was active as of the DVD's release. It contained Mirage's voice directing you to the movie's Web site and told you to input the phone number on the site to get access to secret information (including a deleted scene not included on the DVD). The requirement to enter the phone number was subsequently removed and the phone number no longer works

• John Barry was originally hired to score the film in his James Bond-style, but left the project after recording only a few demo themes; some were used for theater trailers

• In the early part of the film, there is a repeated theme of pencils being knocked over. Dropping pencils is a standard demo feature of dynamics programming in 3D design applications

• In the opening chase scene, the radio announcer says that the bank robbers are fleeing on San Pablo Avenue. San Pablo Avenue is a real street in Emeryville, California, close to where the Pixar Studios is located. Most of the streets in the map indicator in Mr. Incredible's car are also real streets in Emeryville

• Brad Bird drove his teams hard to be as creative as possible, insisting on greater attention to details and characters than any other previous Pixar production. The teams responded by pumping the film full of references and in-jokes, one of the most noticeable being the villain Syndrome being modeled on Bird himself

• In the whole movie, you can see 35 explosions, 189 buttons being pressed, and approximately 640 gunshots

Up Trivia**

Up is the first Pixar film to be rated PG, since The Incredibles. Both films fully deserve their ratings. Up is also the first time you see some blood in a Pixar film.

*All trivia is courtesy of IMDb

**Trivia written by James P.