Not Coming to a Theater Near You
There are things you do hate, Lord. Perfume-smellin’ things, lacy things, things with curly hair.
There are things you do hate, Lord. Perfume-smellin’ things, lacy things, things with curly hair.
Beneath a Pixar film’s cute, clever touches and tremendous action setpieces lies something like darkness. Can you imagine any other studio turning a blockbuster sequel about sentient toys into a bittersweet reflection on mortality, or making a movie that uses hilarious fuzzy monsters to tell a story of parental anxieties and the consequences of unethical development of resources? WALL-E turns the equation on its head and offers, in its grim postapocalyptic landscape, wide-eyed and unadulterated hope for us all. This film sees as much beauty in the universe as WALL-E sees in the lovely junk all around him.
The robot love story is always front and center, with the saving-of-Earth a mere subplot, a side effect of WALL-E and EVE’s romantic misadventures. Both are motivated only by their own programming (EVE is after the plant because it’s her directive— she’s not really invested in outcomes beyond that) and by their burgeoning desires for each other, which subsume their programming in the end. And whenever they act out of love, beautiful things happen, whether it’s a ballet in space (dear God, what a scene!) or the waking up of humanity.
Considering the humans are the ones who broke the planet through overconsumption, they come off pretty well here too— full of enthusiasm to get cracking and set themselves straight, even after generations of inactivity. All it takes is opening their eyes and showing them something worth loving. John and Mary get knocked off their conveyor belts and find love in each other, while the captain gradually falls in love with all of Earth culture that he’s never had the chance to experience. And the great act of love that they witness as EVE rescues WALL-E seems to be the spark they all needed. Interestingly, there’s no real bitterness or anger in the handling of how the Earth got so screwed up in the first place— the details are sort of blithely skipped over, because they really just don’t matter. If there’s a call to action here, it’s refreshingly blame-free, based instead on pure inspiration. And it’s striking what a lack of real villainy there is, too. Yes, there is a force on the ship that wants to stop anyone from going back to Earth— but is that force born of actual evil? No— it’s born of giving up, because giving up hope is really the worst thing anyone can do in this film.
I fear that I’m making WALL-E sound far too touchy-feely hippy-dippy, when it doesn’t really feel that way to watch it. In fact, I’ve mainly talked about the plot-heavy second half, when it’s the much more impressionistic first half that mentally prepares you for what’s to come. Watching WALL-E scoot around this decrepid planet and find amazement in the likes of lightbulbs and a Hello, Dolly video opens you up to the film’s vision, so that everything that follows is utterly believable: two robots acting only out of love can save a species. In these cynical times, WALL-E seems to have floated down from lightyears away.
by Megan Weireter | Source:
10 Jul 2008 3:44 PM | Comments (3)
Personally I liked the first half a lot better than the second, which I thought got a little over-obvious and even preachy. Though there were great moments all the way through, including the space ballet.
Also, I thought it was funny that EVE is basically an iPod.
I agree that the first half has the best stuff, but I wanted to write some kind of non-defensive defense of the second half, which seems to be getting battered around by people who see it as leftist propaganda or something. Although I didn’t feel preached too, I see what you mean— I just thought it was a pretty soft sell ultimately.
I spoke with someone recently who reads the whole EVE and WALL-E relationship as some kind of statement about how Mac users and PC users can find peace with each other.
The first half is a masterpiece—the first American main stream silent since Mel Brook’s Silent Movie. The second half…oh well, half a classic is better than none.
Evan
10 July 2008
8:31 PM