Pixar Retrospective: "WALL•E"
"WALL•E" (2008)
Starring: Ben Burtt, Elissa Knight
Directed by: Andrew Stanton
"WALL•E" is the film that sold me on pixar. I saw the original "Toy Story," and I think I saw a few other pixar's before "WALL•E," probably "Finding Nemo" and maybe a couple more, but "WALL•E" showed me how truly creative and outside-the-box pixar was. When I saw the original trailer for "WALL•E" I was thoroughly unimpressed. A robot on the ground looking at space, and a weird robotic voice announcing the film's title? I had no idea what the film was about, and I wasn't too interested. Fast forward to the summer of 2008, and "WALL•E" was getting some pretty good reviews. I was in Washington DC visiting a friend from high school, and we decided to go to the movies. Since "WALL•E" was all the rage, I wanted to see what all the fuss was about. So, I went to see it, while my friends saw some other nonsense ("Hancock," maybe?).
I was amazed; it was one of the best theatrical experiences I've ever had. I had no idea that the true story behind "WALL•E" was an Earth deserted by humanity's wasteful ways, and now we're in space for generations, growing fat and complacent and living just for the sake of living. If "Ratatouille" was a more mature-ish film for pixar, "WALL•E" is on a whole different level. It can easily rank up there with some of the best science-fiction films, and it's depiction of a world gone bad by our carelessness was chilling.
If pixar just stopped there, it would've been an amazing film. However, they went a step further, and decided to limit the dialogue between the film's two main characters, WALL•E and EVE. Instead, we saw a whole lot of communication through body language and facial expressions, namely eye movement. Anger, concern, love, sadness, and joy were expressed through perhaps the most basic form of communication. This is arguably pixar's most artistic work. Just watching the beautiful animation, with the music and scenes taking place without dialogue, it's just a work of art. Coupled with a strong story, it shows why pixar achieved the name it did.
This remains one of my favorite pixar films. The best goes to "Toy Story 3," which is a thematically stronger film, in my opinion. I feel like, after "Cars," which definitely was appealing to children (perhaps slightly more so than to adults), pixar's subsequent two outings were slightly skewed more towards the older population of children or young adults. Both "Ratatouille" and "WALL•E" don't seem as appealing to children on the outside, and "WALL•E" especially has a deeper, more involved plot that I imagine is beyond the grasp of younger kids. Having never actually spoken to a kid about either of these two films, though, I could be totally off.
"WALL•E," to me, represented a breakthrough in animation, and my first good look at the breathtaking work pixar does. After this, I became a pixar fan, and even if the trailers look bad (like the teaser for "Up"), I still can't wait to see each pixar movie, if only to recapture a bit of the wonder I experienced when seeing "WALL•E" for the first time.
Starring: Ben Burtt, Elissa Knight
Directed by: Andrew Stanton
"WALL•E" is the film that sold me on pixar. I saw the original "Toy Story," and I think I saw a few other pixar's before "WALL•E," probably "Finding Nemo" and maybe a couple more, but "WALL•E" showed me how truly creative and outside-the-box pixar was. When I saw the original trailer for "WALL•E" I was thoroughly unimpressed. A robot on the ground looking at space, and a weird robotic voice announcing the film's title? I had no idea what the film was about, and I wasn't too interested. Fast forward to the summer of 2008, and "WALL•E" was getting some pretty good reviews. I was in Washington DC visiting a friend from high school, and we decided to go to the movies. Since "WALL•E" was all the rage, I wanted to see what all the fuss was about. So, I went to see it, while my friends saw some other nonsense ("Hancock," maybe?).
I was amazed; it was one of the best theatrical experiences I've ever had. I had no idea that the true story behind "WALL•E" was an Earth deserted by humanity's wasteful ways, and now we're in space for generations, growing fat and complacent and living just for the sake of living. If "Ratatouille" was a more mature-ish film for pixar, "WALL•E" is on a whole different level. It can easily rank up there with some of the best science-fiction films, and it's depiction of a world gone bad by our carelessness was chilling.
If pixar just stopped there, it would've been an amazing film. However, they went a step further, and decided to limit the dialogue between the film's two main characters, WALL•E and EVE. Instead, we saw a whole lot of communication through body language and facial expressions, namely eye movement. Anger, concern, love, sadness, and joy were expressed through perhaps the most basic form of communication. This is arguably pixar's most artistic work. Just watching the beautiful animation, with the music and scenes taking place without dialogue, it's just a work of art. Coupled with a strong story, it shows why pixar achieved the name it did.
This remains one of my favorite pixar films. The best goes to "Toy Story 3," which is a thematically stronger film, in my opinion. I feel like, after "Cars," which definitely was appealing to children (perhaps slightly more so than to adults), pixar's subsequent two outings were slightly skewed more towards the older population of children or young adults. Both "Ratatouille" and "WALL•E" don't seem as appealing to children on the outside, and "WALL•E" especially has a deeper, more involved plot that I imagine is beyond the grasp of younger kids. Having never actually spoken to a kid about either of these two films, though, I could be totally off.
"WALL•E," to me, represented a breakthrough in animation, and my first good look at the breathtaking work pixar does. After this, I became a pixar fan, and even if the trailers look bad (like the teaser for "Up"), I still can't wait to see each pixar movie, if only to recapture a bit of the wonder I experienced when seeing "WALL•E" for the first time.
posted by DarthDooku at
2:23 PM
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