Wall-E
I watched Wall-e for the - what, fifth since it came out? - time yesterday, and I thought I'd post about it. Yes, entirely to talk about sweet, adorable Wall-e. Who's complaining? If you happen to be one of the heathens who hasn't a clue what I'm going on about, go find the trailer on Youtube. I tried to embed it, and I failed.
Behind the cut is basically pure fangirling, with some interpretations, character evaluations, and director-speak thrown in. I'll recommend you wait to see the movie before you read this, since I'm not taking time to explain characters or plot, and I sort of give away some stuff, but I won't insist. If you think it will make you more inclined to see it, go ahead.
Seriously, who doesn't love Wall-e? He's cute, sweet, and fairly intelligent for someone who's never seen another sentient being in his life. I always spend most of the movie wishing I could just scoop him off the screen and cuddle him. He's the first movie character I would chose to cuddle. It's one of the things that makes his initial relationship with Eve (I know it should be all caps. I don't care, either) so heart-rending. I don’t know how they made a character who never speaks (except for ‘Wall-e’ ‘Eve’ and ‘plant’) so adorable. It’s something about the way his eyes and arms move, and his little noises. My fave? His little, ‘whoa!’ noise. The way he talks is great, too. ‘E-ee-vah!’ is the coolest pronunciation ever. If I ever have a daughter, I may need to name her Eve so that it can be her nickname.
I’ll start with the opening few sequences. The first moment of a movie is so important. You’re sitting in the movie theater, mind blank, popcorn in hand. The trailers finally end, and you settle back in your chair in relief. The screen goes black, and suddenly the last thing you expect to hear meets your ears. “Out there, there’s a world outside of Yonkers, way out beyond this hick town, Barnaby! It’s a slick town, Barnaby! Out there, full of shine and full of sparkle,” *begins to dance, stops, and looks around self-consciously* um, sorry. I get carried away when it comes to that song. It’s a great opening. The camera pans in on earth, so obviously abandoned and ruined, except for this one, sweet little robot. Wall-e. The next ten minutes are what happened to earth, with that great billboard advertisement: “Too much garbage in your face? There’s plenty of space, out in space!”. All of the people, we realize, are on the Axiom, a space cruise. I thought this whole sequence was genius. I was incredibly creeped out by the B&L CEO’s title: global CEO. CEO of B&Ls globally, or CEO of the globe? I wonder uneasily. The latter seems more likely, really.
I also loved the little lol moments they stuck throughout the movie: Wall-e’s cockroach friend (since cockroaches will survive the apocalypse) eats twinkies (‘cause they will, too!). Wall-e has a collection of garden gnomes, which just rocks. Wall-e makes the mac startup sound when he’s fully charged. Wall-e acts like an office worker sans coffee in the mornings. The entire scene where he’s looking through the garbage (I laugh like a lunatic when puts the bra on his face. Every time). If they had a single failed joke in that movie, it failed really badly ‘cause I didn’t even notice it.
Eve’s appearance in the movie was almost a surprise to me, even though I had seen her in the trailers. After fifteen minutes with the little robot, I almost believed he was the last creature (sorta) on earth. It gave Eve an otherworldly aura, and it was easy to sympathize with Wall-e’s feelings for her. She, on the other hand, just ignores him. She’s obviously sweet, though. Look at how she treated the cockroach. However, I always wondered how she planned to find life if she shoots everything that moves. And a few that don’t. You can just hear a little, ‘so there!’ when she blows up the boats. While I’m talking about Eve, I’d like to make a little shout out to my fellow Sounisians: Did Eve and Wall-e ever remind you, however slightly, of Attolia and Gen? Some of the scenes even match up - imagine the first Eve scene, where she flies around the city, with orange trees.
Did you know Eve was originally based off of the ipod? (if you’re noticing all the mac references in the movie, you can thank Steve Jobs, who now works for Disney in some high-up position. Me and my Dad, who’s an enormous Disney geek, think he might just be the one to save Disney. He’s already ditched the Princess sequels, hooray!). I always enjoyed the slight implication that Wall-e might just be based off the PC. Not that I don’t like PCs! I love my PC! But I do think it’s sorta funny.
Let’s skip ahead a little, so I can say I found the first Axiom scene chilling. It looks like the death star when you first see it! All the people are enormously fat, and laze around in floating lawn chairs all day. The captain is so fat he has to wear his shirt as a cape (thanks to my dad for pointing that out!). The question you have to ask yourself is, would you go? Doesn’t the Axiom sound amazing? Perfect? Relaxing? I know I would’ve gone. But then looked how it turned out. The babies are raised by robots (‘A is for Axiom, your home sweet home. B is for Buy and Large, your very best friend’), and everyone drinks their food (‘it’s lunch, in a cup!’). The way Wall-e changes the outlook of the people he meets is amazing. He might be the first thing they’ve seen with a purpose! Of course everyone knew Mary and John would end up together. They’re so wonderful. The scene at the end, where she yells, ‘John, get ready to hug some kids!’ really was a great moment. It was those people, the Captain, Mary, and John, who would be the hope for the human race in the years to come.
I know, I’ve been fangirling for hours now and I haven’t mentioned the bad guy. Otto. Everyone hates him, and the moment where he’s ‘relieved of duty’ almost had me cheering, too. But he actually didn’t seem like the bad guy to me. The guy I really hated was the global CEO. Come on, ‘easier’? where’s the fun in easy? Otto was doing what he was told, just like, wait for it, Eve. If she had had another job, she might have done the same things Otto did. It took very interesting circumstances for the different robots to gain personalities. Wall-e’s endless boredom, Eve’s attraction to Wall-e, Mo’s frustration at Wall-e’s ‘foreign contaminant’ - each give them the start to the personalities that make them so loveable. Do I think Eve would be exactly like Otto if she was the autopilot? No, I don’t. But I do think she would be machinelike, cold, and emotionless (again, hey Sounisians! Sound familiar?). I also think the Captain would have had a heart attack. He almost did, when Eve came in with the plant. I always laugh when she salutes him, and he seems so befuddled. It’s very much the moment when computers are smarter (and better looking) than we are.
I’ll end with saying that I loved the credits. I love that song, need to get it for my Eve probe - I mean ipod - it’s called ‘down to earth’, I think. It’s a really cool song, with a lot of interesting insights to the movie without being too obvious about it. So many movies do that thing where they write a song for the credits. Anyone remember that terrible movie ‘sharkboy and lavagirl’? There was some abominable song about dreams at the end of it. It was stuck in my head, and it was embarrassing. I hate being embarrassed (I hope a lot of Sounisians read this, I’ve been putting so many little lols in here for them). I love the artwork, how it changes like the art of the recolonizers might have. Starting with the cavemen drawings, then the hieroglyphs, and finally the impressionism. Beautiful. And I like how the different robots help them, like Eve drilling the well. And that final moment when they walk through the park, and the camera pans down so that you can see that, beneath all the trees, the boot is still there.
So yeah. If you haven’t seen it yet, go rent it or something. I don’t say this very often, but I do think that movie is an instant classic. It’s one of those movies that really renewed my wanting to become a director - I left that theater saying, I want to have the effect on someone else that that movie did on me. I wanted to go out and do something, and prove I wasn’t like the Axiom people. Because, when it’s all said and done, how close are we to being like them? Think about it. It’s a humbling thought.