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Wall*E

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Ara-anna
Post subject: Wall*E
Posted: Fri 11 Jul , 2008 10:37 pm
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After reading The Dark Knight thread, I figured we needed one of these.

My review:

Wall*E is good, really good. It is one of the best film Pixar has made to date and could eventually prove to be one of the best animated films ever.

The visuals are rich and detailed and some of the shots made me scratch my head wondering if there was something done for a live-action film. The film is incredibly shot and shows a good deal of detail.

As for Wall*E himself for a character that doesn’t talk he has heart and is very endearing. There are many characters in the film, including Eve. Well I don’t want spoilers, but I cried at least twice. The really cool part is even the bit players are done really well and make good use of the time they are on screen.

The story is pretty simple, it’s about a lonely robot who yearns for friends and companions. There is subtext in the movie about consumerism, environment and corporations (ect.) but to me it wasn’t too over the top.

I found Wall*E to be one of the best films I have seen in a long long time, years even. 9.5 out of 10.

And the Presto bit isn’t too bad either.

Now onto HBII - The Golden Army and The Dark Knight.

For the record Wall*E is fresher than HBII on RottenTomatoes, so HBII and TDK better knock my socks off or I am routing for Wall*E as best film this year. Well in my own awards anyway.

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yovargas
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Posted: Fri 11 Jul , 2008 11:00 pm
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I seriously think this is a contender for best movie I've ever seen. I'm gonna see it again before making such a judgment but it is really astoundingly good.


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Impenitent
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Posted: Fri 11 Jul , 2008 11:28 pm
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I've honestly never heard of it! Never seen it advertised anywhere! I suspect it has simply not been released in Australia, and that there is no intention of doing so - which is bizarre in view of the praise I'm reading here.

I'll do some targetted searching and perhaps I'll prove myself wrong (I do live under a rock most of the time, after all.)

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Dave_LF
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Posted: Sat 12 Jul , 2008 12:07 am
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It's another top-notch animated kids flick from Pixar, but I find the "instant classic" stuff from so many quarters a bit surprising, to be honest. The design and animation of the various machines and robots is extremely well done and whoever's responsible deserves an award, but it is a kids movie at the end of the day, with fairly cliche characters and an obvious moral lesson delivered with a ham fist. I don't mean those things as criticisms--they're appropriate for the genre--but probably not for a classic.


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Dawnnamira
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Posted: Sat 12 Jul , 2008 1:22 am
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I absolutely loved Wall-E. I won't say it's an instant classic, or that everyone has to love it.

But I loved it.

I mean, come on....the cockroach lived in a Twinkie! :love:

So many great lines, and visual puns, and such that in MY opinion it's not just a kid movie. Adults can watch it and enjoy things the kids won't pick up.

((I will admit that I was slightly distracted by snatches of Hancock in the rear-view mirror...drive-in theaters rock...))

I looked forward to it from the first time I saw a trailer (let's see...that would be February?)). I honestly wasn't expecting much of a plot, so I was pleasantly surprised to see how everything worked out.

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Axordil
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Posted: Sat 12 Jul , 2008 4:31 am
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Dave--

It's a kid movie like Moby Dick is an adventure story. The "moral" appears superficial because it's not the actual moral. Seriously, there's layers of stuff there. I could go on for pages. It's like they made a movie for lit majors disguised as a children's flick.

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yovargas
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Posted: Sat 12 Jul , 2008 4:55 am
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Axordil wrote:
I could go on for pages.
Oh, wouldja? Wouldja pretty please? :pray:


:D

:love:


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Dave_LF
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Posted: Sat 12 Jul , 2008 3:37 pm
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I'd love to hear it too. Maybe just the first page? :whistle:


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Axordil
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Posted: Sat 12 Jul , 2008 4:43 pm
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Well, here's the core of it--spoilers follow, obviously.

The central paradox of the film is that humanity is ultimately redeemed (I use that word deliberately) by the same trait that pushed it to the edge of oblivion: its casual creation and disposal not just of stuff, but of reflections of itself. Our urge to create is a mirror to our urge to procreate: our artifacts are as much our progeny as our children.

WALL-E, left alone amidst the towering remnants of consumerist culture, and programmed with as Sisyphean a task as any factory or office drone, eventually extracts from all that stuff the spark of what it is to be human. He manages to, from the darkness of mere existence, kindle the light not just of consciousness but of, well, humanity. In doing so, though, he also discovers loneliness.

When he goes to the Axiom out of a desire to protect EVE (and here the symbolism is pretty obvious--not just the name, but the womb-like cavity in which she bears the last natural living thing we know of) WALL-E takes with him what remains of the human experience. He proceeds to, by dint of mere casual contact, to spread that spark to both other robots and what passes for human beings. The marker for the viral meme being spread is the ditty from Hello Dolly, one of the more mediocre examples of a not-exactly-highbrow art form, the movie musical, which shows just how powerful it is--even in what might be termed a debased and diluted form, it beats the snot out of the void of mere being humanity is in.

The humans on the Axiom, having automated themselves into perpetual infancy, are as isolated as WALL-E was. Bereft of purpose beyond continuing, cut off from each other, they mirror his drone-like directive: they continue to consume and discard, while WALL-E's big brothers below continue to stack and dispose their leavings. The robots on the Axiom have purposefulness at least (until they have breakdowns) but can't go "outside the box" until they bump into WALL-E, as witnessed by MO's deciding to go off the guideline, the button-pusher's learning to wave, and of course the unhinged robots discovering that they can still have a purpose, even if it's not exactly what they were intended for. WALL-E is the snowflake that starts the avalanche.

So with the humans. The captain, nudged by the return of EVE with a living thing from Earth (courtesy of WALL-E) starts asking questions. John and Mary, forced off their guidelines as MO was his by bumping into WALL-E, rediscover the small pleasures of living in reality with other people. They rediscover purpose, physical contact, engagement with their environment--and standing upright. Instead of flailing around waiting to be plopped back into a floating chair, John and Mary are capable of working together on their own volition to catch the falling babies. Instead of taking the word of a long-dead human CEO and a monomaniacal autopilot for it (and IS this really the first time an EVE came back with something, or merely the first time it wasn't swept under the rug by the autopilot?), the Captain decides that maybe they should go check out what's left of Earth for themselves.

And things get better. :)

That's the story/character analysis. I will leave the more cinematic analysis to a movie person--but even I caught a couple of dozen references, from the obvious (2001, Silent Running, any number of Chaplain and Keaton silent films) to the obscure (sight gags from Bugs Bunny vs. Marvin the Martian) to the sublime (I would argue that the film closest in visual style to the first half of the movie is Lawrence of Arabia).

Italics edit.

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yovargas
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Posted: Sat 12 Jul , 2008 5:21 pm
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Yes, yes, yes!!
Quote:
WALL-E is the snowflake that starts the avalanche.
Ain't he grand, though. :love: :love: :love:


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Dave_LF
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Posted: Sat 12 Jul , 2008 5:36 pm
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What did you think the "actual" moral was? I took it as a millennial version of "turn off the TV and go play outside". It was more than a little ironic having a movie deliver this message to an audience sitting inert, cradling their popcorn buckets and big gulp sodas. The creators seemed self-aware, though. Did anyone else stick around to the end of the credits? :D


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Axordil
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Posted: Sat 12 Jul , 2008 5:52 pm
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The "don't be a coach potato" motif is there, but the coach-potatohood is only a symptom. What the humans on the Axiom are suffering from is purposelessness, not overconsumption or even laziness. What is there for them to do at this point if they're out there forever being taken care of by the robots their ancestors created? The people in the floating chairs aren't fat because they never move--they're fat because babies are fat, and that's where they are, between the bone loss and the lack of reason for doing anything beyond consuming and disposing. But like babies, too, they can--if prompted to--grow up, stand on their own feet, and discover what it is they're about.

The actual moral, or message rather (a moral implies a directive ;) ) is that humanity is both tremendously resilient and tremendously fragile. Fragile, because we could break ourselves, and are always threatening to; resilient, because the things that make us possible are so simple even a child (or robot) could understand them, given the chance.

But even that is reductive. Perhaps the message is that looking for one message in anything is problematic. :D

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In some cases, firing the drummer helps.


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Dave_LF
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Posted: Sat 12 Jul , 2008 6:16 pm
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Well, not just couch-potatoism and laziness, but also extracting one's self from the attificial matrix of video games, instant messaging, media, and advertising (in a high-tech computer-animated film financed by Disney, hence the at-times almost painful irony) and doing something real, like taking care of children, conversing, fishing, or planting peas. All of which, in the credits montage, are tasks the robots help with. That's another angle about making sure technology is the servant and not the master.

You're right; there are a lot of layers there.


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Axordil
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Posted: Sat 12 Jul , 2008 6:46 pm
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And the irony (I would call it delicious, not painful, but I'm like that) of a movie about piles of crap choking out life being made by the king of selling crap is one of those layers. But it doesn't undercut the message--it complicates it. Remember, that crap contains the seed of salvation too...and if being made by Disney undercuts an antimaterialist message, does not an antimaterialist message also undercut Disney's behavior?

It will be instructive to see what happens when Lassiter and Pixar have fully co-opted the company that bought them out. He's running their movie division, he's about to take over the theme parks.

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Dave_LF
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Posted: Sat 12 Jul , 2008 7:12 pm
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I found the irony delicious once I was sure they were aware of it. ;)

I was reminded of a Calvin and Hobbes comic that pokes fun of the quality of newspaper reporting. In the 10th Anniversary collection, Watterson remarks alongside it that newspapers resent having to print comics, but sometimes artists resent being published in newspapers. And of course Watterson was not the first artist or prophet to find himself in that particular predicament.


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yovargas
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Posted: Sat 12 Jul , 2008 7:51 pm
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Jeez, Ax, if you're not careful, you might make me thing this is the best thing since sliced bread. Maybe even better! :D


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Axordil
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Posted: Sat 12 Jul , 2008 8:20 pm
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Pixar is the best thing since sliced bread right now, in terms of movies. They haven't made a bad one yet. Even their more superficial (and thus IMO so-so) efforts, like A Bug's Life and Cars, have some thematic depth and emotional nuance to them. They're not bad, they're only not as good. I mean, look at what they've put out in the way of features:

Toy Story
A Bug's Life
Toy Story 2
Monsters Inc.
Finding Nemo
The Incredibles
Cars
Ratatouille
WALL-E

The thing Pixar always has going for it is craftsmanship. That's not just the technical aspect (at which they're superb of course), but more importantly the craft of storytelling. Characters drive the stories. The stories take the characters places. And we get to go along for the ride, lucky us.

Contrast the efforts of the computer animation unit at Dreamworks, or Disney's own non-Pixar group. It's possible to be brilliant technically and not be able to support a story with a derrick.

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In some cases, firing the drummer helps.


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yovargas
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Posted: Sat 12 Jul , 2008 8:27 pm
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WALL-E is likely deserving of the title Best Pixar Movie. But I think Ratatouille is my favorite probably because it is at it's heart a movie about an artist and the creative passion. As I fancy myself a bit of an artist and art lover, it's a movie that speaks to me in a really personal level. :)


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Axordil
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Posted: Sat 12 Jul , 2008 8:57 pm
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I understand that distinction. There are movies that touch me on very personal levels, and there are ones I can tell are fantastically well made, and there are ones that I can "play around in" critically. All three kinds are "favorites" in different ways.

Then there are guilty pleasures, but we won't go there right now. :D

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halplm
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Posted: Sun 13 Jul , 2008 5:48 am
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Saw it today. Certainly my favorite Pixar film since The Incredibles, but I do find the praise here a bit excessive :P.

Ax, while your analysis is intriguing, and for people that see the movie that deeply, it is a refreshingly satisfying film much like the rest of Pixar's films (except Finding Nemo, which I can barely stand to watch). However, the vast majority of people will only see the extremely heavy handed messages that are so obvious the kids can't miss them. In order for the film to really surpass the wealth of extremely good movies out there, those messages could have been done better, if necessary at all.

There were parts I wanted more (what were the sudden dust storms? Where was the rest of humanity?), and there were parts that were too impossible it took me out of the movie for moments here and there (EVE could be heard breathing several times, each time seemed odd. I found the excessivness of the garbage to be impossible to believe, and where do they create all the stuff that gets thrown away on the ship? Spaceships can't generate waste for 700 years sending that much of it away on a continuous basis).

It's a good movie, maybe even a great movie, but it suffers from it's genre.

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