It's always really exciting going to the Surprise Movie at the Cambridge Film Festival. You take a risk when you buy a ticket - it's a bit like being in a Book Club where you have to read sci-fi when you only usually read chick-lit.

I remember the time the lights dimmed and the credits for "Heart of Gold" were revealed. My husband and I were happy, being Neil Young Fans, but it must have been disheartening for Tony Jones, the Festival Organiser, when after five minutes half a dozen people walked out, followed by more dribs and drabs for the next half hour until only the stalwarts remained.

This year a cheer rose when the credits revealed that "Up" was to be the surprise movie. Having wowed audiences at Cannes where it was the first every animated movie to open the festival, I believe, the audience were well primed about its effect and were prepared to love it.

I loved it too - the first fifteen minutes, that is, which were a complete tour-de-force. After that it all got far too exciting with one adventure on top of another, not my sort of thing at all. But the first fifteen minutes where our hero as a young boy meets the girl who is to become his lifelong partner and the story of their life together till she inevitably dies and leaves him a cumudgeonly old widower, was touching beyond anything I've seen in a while. I was heartbroken when she grew up and died, but she had to, for the cumudgeon's new partner in adventure to appear, a lovable fat boy scout with a complicated family background.

Of course, it all worked out beautifully in the end and we wouldn't have had it any other way. It was a coup to get the film and the audience loved it like a bunch of kids would. As a member of the audience shouted, when the lights went down and the credits revealed the surprise: "Good man, Tony Jones!"

Thanks for the heads up J - looks like I'll have to overcome my recent-years antipathy for animated movies to see this one. And I speak as someone who was still absorbed and hanging on to my seat though the end credits of my second watching of Heart Of Gold.

Ta

Z

Good old Neil, eh!

Ahh! Our lot have been looking forward to this so it is great to hear a good review. We plan to go and watch it in 3D because there really is nothing like 3D for animation.