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How nerve-racking is that?

Docter: Quite. At the time, you just want to say, Go away! Let me just make the movie, and I'll show you when I'm done. It's easy for me now to say, "It's fantastic to show these guys." But at the time it's really difficult, and I think ultimately makes for a better film.

Are those sessions ever painful?

Docter: Oh yeah! I've had sessions where people get red in the face and yell. I don't think it really comes down to calling people names or anything, but there is a sense of … I'll just say that everybody is so passionate about what we do. And for all of us, to see anything done less than where we think it could be, you just get worked up about it.

So everybody kind of owns it, even if their name isn't on it.

Docter: Yeah.

Docter (right) and composer Michael Giacchino

Because the Pixar name—the family name—is on it.

Docter: Yeah. It's pretty neat that way. In some ways, I've grown up with that. I started at Pixar when I was 21. I had never made a feature film, and neither had John or Andrew. So we all kind of grew up together, and we just got used to this environment that you don't realize—until you look around—how unique it is and how lucky we are.

When Monsters, Inc. came out, I read an interview where you talked about having your son and how that affected your creative process. You said, "As a Christian having my son has made me even more amazed by the whole creation." And of course Up really highlights creation.

Docter: Yeah, and it hopefully highlights the importance of relationship, because I think that's the heart of Christianity as well. We so easily lose track of that and become self-centered. It's something that I fall back into every day. Having kids is like forcing you to be less selfish, in a way, because you care so much about these other guys and you start to put their interests first. Watching them grow and become their own person is kind of mindboggling. They start out by doing the same things you do and looking at you like you're the cat's pajamas, and then they become themselves. It's pretty fantastic.

In that same interview you said you used to be nervous talking about your faith and your work because "it didn't really connect, but more and more it seems to be connecting for me." Can you flesh that out a little bit?

Docter: It's tricky. I don't think people in any way, shape or form like to be lectured to. When people go to a movie, they want to see some sort of experience of themselves on the screen. They don't come to be taught. So in that sense, and in terms of any sort of beliefs, I don't want to feel as though I'm ever lecturing or putting an agenda forth. It's more of just … It's like a search. I think of myself as struggling and just looking for answers, and sometimes what you think of as a big revelation one day, you start to grow and change and you look at things differently. I'm kind of rambling here, being really vague.

Yeah. I think you're saying something about having audiences read between the lines, rather than hit them over the head with Bible verses or something?

Docter: Exactly. And I think even sometimes people who are decidedly non-Christian have these very Christian things to say. You know what I mean? And I think most people that have a problem with Christianity actually have a problem with the church. That's an over simplification, but people are kind of messy and that gets in the way a lot.

What do you want people to walk out of the theater with after watching Up?

Docter: Basically, the message of the film is that the real adventure of life is the relationship we have with other people, and it's so easy to lose sight of the things we have and the people that are around us until they're gone. More often than not I don't really realize how lucky I was to have known someone until they're either moved or passed away. So if you can kind of wake up a little bit and go, Wow, I've got some really cool stuff around me every day, then that's what the movie's about.

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