WallE

Andrew Stanton, US, 2008, 98 minutes

Ladies and gentleman: please rise in salute of the greatest animated feature ever made. Controversial perhaps, but I honestly believe that in Wall-E, Pixar have not merely surpassed their previous highpoint of Toy Story but have created a film that will be rightly remembered in years to come as a classic of any genre.

Wall-E is the second Pixar film to be directed by Andrew Stanton. Stanton’s first, Finding Nemo, was perhaps the funniest Pixar to date, but fell short of greatness due to an overly sentimental, under-realised plot. However, the stunning reproduction of the complexity of the ocean suggested that given a plot worthy of the film Stanton had the potential to make a classic. Having conquered the ocean, space was the obvious next step.

Wall-E is the story of the last robot on Earth. Shortly after the present day, the Earth became so polluted that its inhabitants were forced to sail off into space, leaving robots behind to clear up the mess. In 2700 Wall-E is the last remaining such robot. He leads a lonely life moving around rubbish into piles, barely making a dent in the vast piles of waste which litter the environment. This all changes with the arrival of a spaceship carrying Eve, a search robot sent to scan the Earth for signs of life. Starved of company for so long, Wall-E is instantly smitten with Eve. When Eve is summoned back to her ship having discovered the first signs of re-emerging life, Wall-E stows away on board. The captain is delighted to learn that the humans can return to Earth. However, when the autopilot goes rogue in an attempt to prevent the ship returning to Earth, it is up to Wall-E and Eve to save the day.

The film is undoubtedly Pixar’s most ambitious film since Toy Story. While The Incredibles created a film filled with human characters, in itself a huge achievement, Wall-E attempts to integrate humans with not only a wide array of robot characters but also with a live action Fred Willard, whose appearance in any film elevates it to the realms of genius. That they succeed with all three of these is a testament to the animators who remain on a different plane to their competitors.

The ambition does not merely extend to the animation though. While most filmmakers would prefer to marry innovation to the strengths that have helped them to reach this stage, Pixar have instead chosen to sideline the number one reason that they have become the most profitable studio in the US – their scripts. The first thirty minutes of Wall-E are virtually silent, with not a word spoken and reliance placed on sound effects maestro Ben Burtt, the genius whose CV includes such iconic films as the Indiana Jones and Star Wars series’. All this in a supposed kids film, at a time when the attention span of kids has supposedly never been lower. It is incredibly refreshing to see a Hollywood studio taking risks, attempting to break new ground artistically where it would have been easy to simply trot out a mediocre buddy comedy and watch the money roll in regardless.

So what is it that makes Wall-E great? Apart from its ambition and originality, it possesses in the titular robot one of the most adorable characters ever put on screen. Anyone who doubts that a robot could break your heart will be ground down by the sheer force of the cuteness on screen. Visually, the film is yet another step forward by Pixar. In particularly, the opening scene where the camera begins in space and zooms through the atmosphere to sweep along the surface of the abandoned Earth is a tremendous feat of animation. As this is a Pixar film, there is inevitably a moralistic element in play. However, rather than a simple message of friendship, the film has far more interesting intentions. The plot contains obvious environmentalist intentions which are portrayed effectively. The film is equally interesting however in its approach to the human characters. 700 years in the future, human kind are horribly overweight and oblivious to the outside world, immersed in their TV screens and happy to be told what to wear and how to act. It may seem slightly ironic for a Hollywood film to warn of the perils of watching too much TV, but the gleefully un-PC manner with which the film sets about making fun of its human characters makes a welcome change from the more preachy moralising of previous Pixar films.

I could continue talking for hours on end. However, suffice it to say that this film will be spoken about 50 years from now as a landmark in cinema history. Make sure you’re there to witness it first-hand.

Review by Neil Henry
Written for EUFS Programme Spring 2009