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Dir. Andrew Stanton
Rating: 6.5 | 0 User Reviews | Send to Friend
By Jes Sipling
No Reese's Pieces or glowing fingers make an appearance in Pixar's ninth feature, but the film does bring ET's heart back to Earth, this time with more message than magic. At some point in the 29th century, human irresponsibility and waste has driven all life from this planet and onto an endless space cruise. Left over from a failed attempt to save our habitat, one Waste Allocation Load Lifter Earth-class robot remains (voice of Ben Burtt), along with his cockroach best friend. WALL-E spends his time constructing an intricate city of skyscrapers from compacted trash and singing to himself with his play button. He also totes along an '80s style lunch box in which he collects an array of treasures: old toys, videos, Christmas lights and extra robot pieces for when he breaks down -- the ultimate dumpster diver! Tucked away in a broken down truck, WALL-E has created a humble home of his things, but what he loves most is his copy of Hello, Dolly!, a movie that not only has taught this curious little robot about love but makes up a large part of the dialogue. His routine, however, is terrifyingly interrupted when a mega-ship deposits an EVE (Extra-terrestrial Vegetation Evaluator), a sleek white girl-probe, as sexy as the iMac and with a trigger-happy penchant for blowing things up. She attracts the determined interest of a quivering, love-stricken WALL-E. The social commentary starts about here: After discovering a baby plant, EVE's directive kicks in, calling her ship back from space taking us on a breathtaking CGI galaxy ride to AXIOM, a cruise-liner owned by the mega-corporation Buy N' Large. Out in space, grossly overweight humans wear matching track suits (what irony), float around on hover-lounges, Big Gulps in hand, and interact through digi-screens from two-feet apart. After the dig on consumerism comes the environmentalist plug: the baby plant means the ship can return to Earth, a place none of them have ever seen, and once AXIOM's Captain (voice of Jeff Garlin) gets a lesson on what Earth is all about, he picks up the wilting sprout and says, "I get it, you just need someone to look after you." But Al Gore propaganda and child-brainwashing aside, WALL-E is still a surprisingly touching love story with more than enough laughs, and (by-and-large) it also displays what Pixar does best: detail. Unfortunately, some of these details will serve to make a lot of parents feel pretty uncomfortable about themselves.
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