An animated comedy adventure helped lift the mood at the start of the Cannes film festival as cinema's biggest and glitziest gathering prepared to roll out the red carpet yesterday.

Up, directed by Pete Docter and produced by Disney's Pixar studios, has already been hailed as a triumph in advance reviews and was warmly applauded at its opening press screening, where journalists donned special goggles to see its 3D effects.

A Chopard representative displays the Palme d'Or in Cannes May 12, 2009. The 62nd Cannes Film Festival runs from May 13-24.

"A captivating odd-couple adventure that becomes funnier and more exciting as it flies along," as trade paper Variety described it, the tale of a retired balloon salesman and a zealous boy scout who fly to South America is not in the main competition.

But it adds the touch of Hollywood magic that is a big part of the Cannes mystique and may help outweigh a mood of anxiety and caution on the palm-lined Croisette waterfront this year.

As the town prepared for the traditional red carpet ceremony that was to kick off the main part of the festival later yesterday, the early talk was mainly of budget cutbacks and a recession that has hit both studios and the press.

Festival director Thierry Fremaux said he believes that this year there will be fewer of the celebrity-driven peripheral events that make Cannes the destination of choice for the world's top stars and movie moguls.

The more restrained mood, however, may return the focus to the festival's core business.

"Around Cannes, perhaps it was just too much sometimes, too much partying. This year perhaps we can think about the cinema, not the stars and the starlets and the excessiveness of Cannes but the emphasis on the films," Fremaux said.

Yesterday's opening ceremony - the first to feature an animated film - starts 12 days of screenings, interviews, red carpets and revelry in the glamorous Riviera resort.

Brad Pitt is expected in Cannes with Quentin Tarantino's World War II drama Inglourious Basterds, one of 20 films showing in the main competition and vying for the coveted Palme d'Or for best picture when Cannes winds up on May 24.