REVIEW: Wall-E
This film has taken some flack for a couple of things. But I find those complaints are overblown. The first is an alleged Bush bashing quote where an inept president of Earth utters a “stay the course” line. But it has nothing to do with the Iraq war or even Bush. It did elicit some groans in the audience when I saw it, but it comes and goes pretty fast.
The second issue is the depiction of people in the future all being fat and unable to do anything for themselves, They drink their meals out of cups that look exactly like Big Gulps. The story is a thinly veiled green message about the perils of consumerism and “unsustainable growth”. The future earth is a garbage dump and the human race is on an endless cruise in a giant spaceship where robots cater to people’s every whim. And humans just ly on antti gravity lounge chairs and sip their drinks and talk to their friends on internet screens all day. Yes, it’s a pretty trite comment on society today. But the movie itself is very enjoyable.
It’s a simple love story about two robots who meet when the girl robot, Eve, is sent to earth to find evidence of plant life. Wall-E is a garbage compactor robot, the last operating one left on earth, who is lonely and only has a cockroach for a pet.
A big adventure ensues when Eve sends a message back to the ship that she found plant life. All and all, it’s a very funny and charming film. The green message is rather light weight, kind of like Silent Running, which had similar robots and a rather absurd premise. It was probably an inspiration for this film.
But I wouldn’t let it bother you, if you dislike moralizing, it’s not that kind of film. It’s mostly a fun romp.
Saw the film today. I LOVED it. Pixar’s done it again! Seeing this film nostalgically reminds me of other older animated films in the same vein.
I wasn’t bothered by the environmental message at all, as I thought it was handled quite well, and never found it preachy. I’m glad that all the robot characters (save the villain) were not portrayed as evil and soulless! That’ would’ve been dumb.
I also didn’t necessarily see that CEO guy as Bush-bashing, but rather, I saw it as Michael Eisner-bashing. He did great damage to Disney, resulting in Pixar (among many others) jumping ship for a while! Just like all the robots and fat people who left Earth before the film began. The message was about responsibility and rebuilding, and John Lasseter is rebuilding Disney (after it became a corporate wasteland, like Earth). I’ve seen a similar view from at least one other person in an animation forum.
I wouldn’t worry about the morality issues, either. I highly recommend this film! It was a great sci-fi love story that was really touching at the end.
Posted by John Cassidy on 06/29 at 10:37 PMI thought the intro cartoon was great also. Presto!
Posted by on 06/30 at 07:12 AMCan’t wait to see this one while it’s still in theaters. Re: the “fat” message… actually, Russ Manning already did a number on that one way back in the 60s in an issue of Magnus: Robot Fighter—the humans in this one society, accessable via a dimensional doorway, were so fat they were carried around on big pallets by robots, who also took care of all their needs. And it’s all rather ironic, too, considering how Lasseter and others at Pixar have all put on 20-30 pounds over the course of the company’s existence!
Posted by on 06/30 at 09:49 AMAnother main message of the film is individualism (for both the humans and the robots).
Hud, PRESTO was just plain adorable. It brought some old Bugs Bunny shorts to mind!
Posted by John Cassidy on 06/30 at 10:12 AMI thought you’d find this article interesting. Christianity Today interviews writer/director Andrew Stanton over the film’s story (as well as a few Christian undertones), and that the last thing Stanton wanted to make was a “message movie.” It’s a fun and great read!
http://www.christianitytoday.com/movies/interviews/andrewstanton.html
Posted by John Cassidy on 07/02 at 08:40 AM
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