WALL-E

My heart broke about seven times in the first half hour of Wall-E.

Humans have left the Earth in a mess and blasted off into space to let robots clean up their mess. Poor Wall-E (Waste Allocation Load Lifter-Earth-class) is the only one still clocking in daily and is accompanied only by his pet cockroach. He breaks the monotony of compacting rubbish all day by collecting treasures in a lunch box he fixes to a hook on his back each morning and each night, hauls his finds back to his Aladdin’s cave and shelves them by category –but where does the spork go, with the forks or the spoons?

Soon enough, Wall-E’s simple existence is interrupted by EVE (Extraterrestrial Vegetation Evaluator).She has been sent by the mother ship to access whether photosynthesis has begun again on Earth, in the hope of answering the fundamental question of ‘can life be sustained on Earth again’. For Wall-E, its love at first blast, when EVE tries to blow him up...three times. Soon, she’s back at Wall-E’s checking out his rubix cube, light bulbs and ipod video playing the old movie Hello, Dolly!. It’s when Wall-E shows her the green shoot he’s placed in a boot for safe keeping that the action starts.

I can’t understand how Wall-E is a kids film. Yes, it has a cute robot in it, but the underlying themes are rather political in nature. We have destroyed Earth because of our need for convenience. In space, humans have become fat lumps with no bone definition and no idea of life outside their hover chair. Their lack of exercise over the years means they can no longer walk as we do, let alone sit up without the help of a robot. They go through life with a computer screen in front of their faces, slurping huge drinks. They talk over IM instead of face to face while on a five year cruise that’s lasted seven hundred years.

Is it hypocritical for Disney to be preaching to us? Probably, but this is about the little robot that could, not globalisation and the death of human interaction!

The real treat of this movie is Wall-E’s courtship with EVE. The little moments they share in the first dialogue-free thirty minutes are heart warming and beautiful. Anyone who has yearned to hold another’s hand will see a little of themselves in Wall-E, who never gives up on EVE. It’s a love story that the kids won’t appreciate, but that I thought was just perfect.

Hotness rating: 0 – he’s a robot.

Posted By: Cat