released 01 feb 09 / last mod 01 feb 09 / greg goebel / public domain
* At the beginning of the Disney-Pixar computer animation movie WALL-E, we see the Earth over 700 years in the future, after the trash piled up so much that all the humans had to ship out on starships. An army of robots were left behind to clean up the mess, but after all this time they've been reduced to one, named "WALL-E". (It was a general designation for his model, never mind what it stands for, but since he's the last of them the name is his alone.)
WALL-E is a little trash compactor on tracks who spends all day piling up blocks of compacted trash, and occasionally picking up bits and pieces of human culture out of the rubbish, which he uses to decorate the little "home base" he uses to hide out from storms and the night. His only companion is a cockroach.
He's then surprised when a spaceship comes roaring out the sky, to drop a pod-shaped white explorer fembot named EVE. After some hesitation, he manages to make EVE's acquaintance, but she goes into suspension after finding something unusual -- a growing plant -- and calling for recovery. When the spaceship lands again, WALL-E tags along with it as it returns to the giant spaceliner where humanity is still hanging on.
Or possibly "lying on" is a better term for it, since after centuries in low gravity the humans have become pudgy dolls who are utterly dependent on machines. EVE's discovery is big news, however, and sets off a chain of events that will determine the future of mankind -- helped by WALL-E, EVE, and cast of other robotic characters.
* As with all Disney-Pixar movies, the production is absolutely splendid, and the movie is fun, witty, and entertaining. The only problem with WALL-E is that it seems to want to pretend to have a message; fortunately, this can be ignored, since attempting to load down this movie with anything resembling a serious message is not a good idea -- once anyone takes it seriously the clumsy heavy-handedness of the message and the various gaps in the logic of the premise quickly become very obvious. This is a fun movie, not a thinking movie, and it only fortunate that the effort to make it a thinking movie is too thin to get in the way of the fun.
The end result is entertaining but not memorable, not in a league with the best of the Disney-Pixar movies like THE INCREDIBLES. However, it is well worth the price of admission; Disney always wants to give the customers their money's worth -- the little tribute to Kubrick's 2001: A SPACE ODYSSEY was a gem. Even the end credits, an imaginative summary of the future history of humankind, are a good watch.
And of course, like all Disney-Pixar movies, WALL-E includes extras that aren't just throwaways: BURN-E, involving the frustrations of a welding robot seen in the margins of the movie itself, and PRESTO, the misadventures of a magician versus his rabbit. I usually don't pay much attention to extras, but I always do with Disney-Pixar films, and the extras were no disappointment this time around.
