Wall-E

We take a break from books and turn to a movie today: Wall-E.


Cute but depressing pretty much sums up this movie. Robots that are more human than humans? Wall-E and Eve seem like it. You could find a lot of old school romance tropes in this movie, including the bumbling boy and the meaningful dance and kiss (well, spark). Wall-E courting and looking after Eve was very cute. And the pet cockroach was a great gag, surviving everything that was thrown at it. The crazy robots were a nice touch as well, providing individualism to the ordered and monotone society. I especially enjoyed the cleaner robot. I thought the vocalisation of the robots was interesting, especially the tonal qualities in Wall-E’s voice. Eve’s voice was more distinctive, being a newer robot. The only complaint that I have about the robots is that at times it seemed contrived, like the animators thought “What’s cute? Ooh, robot giggling!” because all the robots were geared to be as cute as they could be.

The depressing part was seeing what humans had become. Fat, lazy people who are completely absorbed in their own entertainment and never seeing beyond their virtual lives. Most humans seem to be jaded from their passing conversation, and you can’t help but think that it’s the creators’ way of inserting their own moralising into what would have been a cute robot romance movie. The captain is one of the few humans who seem to want to move beyond his current existence, and you have to admire his tenacity in trying to get everyone to see what could be when overriding Auto[pilot].

The ending was a nice touch, with the rebuilding of civilisation told through the art styles of the ages. And the credits featured a pixelated rundown of the movie’s plot and the future. Knowing humans though, it’s an optimistic vision, one that I can’t imagine without a lot of difficulties on the way.