Film Review: Wall-E

Director: Andrew Stanton

A 2008 science fiction comedy that actually features very little real dialogue through the first half of the film, the action was mostly CGI created by the popular animation studio Pixar. The film deals with the issues of the destruction of our planet, the impact  that the laziness of the human race has on the planet and consumerism as well as the ability of the main characters as robots to break their programming and develop emotions. It won the Best Animated Feature Award at both the Golden Globes and the Oscars in 2009.

Wall-E is a robot whose job is to collect up trash and compact it into small cubes to help tidy planet Earth. The planet is deserted due to the huge swathes of rubbish produced by mass consumerism facilitated by the mega-corporation Buy 'n' Large, once it becomes apparent that the task is too large the corporation shutdown all these trash compactors except one whilst they escape in large spaceships to live in space. Wall-E seems to have broken his programming and is capable of independent thought but after 700 years alone he finally has a visitor.

Wall-E and Eve

Despite being an animated film that appeals to children, it certainly deals with some much more complex topics like the ones stated above. Stanton stated that he named Eve after the biblical character because Wall-E's loneliness reminded him of Adam, Stanton is a practicing Christian. The film manages to cover and properly dissect all the points without them being distracting, we are always first and foremost rooting for the lovable Wall-E. Whilst his moments with love interest Eve produces some funny and touching moments it does leave a slightly predictable ending for the pair but the film develops excellently from the halfway point. Wall-E does capture the essence of the silent movie era, with very little actual dialogue in the first half so much is expressed by the eyes and body language of the robots themselves.

3.5/4 Sweet but clever satire of how we treat our planet