A Review of Wall-E (2008)

Is Wall-E Pixar's greatest film and, by extension, one of the greatest animated films in the history of cinema? The better question is, are these claims even meaningful in an arena as subjective as entertainment. You may love Cars (which I find unlikely) and I have a strange and lasting fondness for oft-ignored A Bug's Life but the use of hyperbole in critical reviews is, essentially, worthless. Rather we should deal in specifics; Wall-E is one of the most consistently entertaining and enjoyable movies I have seen this year. It is exceptionally animated, technically peerless and has a design aesthetic and attention to detail which would be the envy of most live action films. It also has its negative aspects. Some are common to many Pixar films - it is a little saccharine and, to my mind, the music score is a little lacking. Other issues are more or less unique to this film. I found the voice acting for the human characters a little weak and uninvolving (perhaps intentionally) and the plotting was quite one dimensional, despite supposedly dealing with some extremely complex themes (Centuries of isolation and that old Asimov chestnut of the evolution of robotkind).

I make these points merely to allow an element of realism into the proceedings, something which seems particularly relevant in a week where the Dark Knight is being heralded as the most super amazing awesome and exciting thing to ever flicker through mass consciousness. The hype is interesting and, no doubt, commercially important but after those first few weeks it becomes irrelevant. The real test of a films quality is whether people will continue to watch it in the future, whether it stands the test of time.

Is it smaltzy? Yes, but nowhere near as saccharine as the low points of Finding Nemo.

Is it funny? Yes, it beats misfires like Cars hands down and approaches the rapid fire success of Toy Story 2.

Is it surprisingly dark? Yes, but in the good way that The Incredibles did so well.

In these ways and many others Wall-E is emblematic of Pixar’s ability to learn from its mistakes, expand on its successes and highlights their maturation into one of the most deservedly successful movie studios in the world. I for one would love to see Pixar drop the ‘message’ and the constant reach for a g rating (in this way The Incredibles, with its PG rating, was a step forward) but that may just be my selfishness. I don’t want to share these films with anyone else. Sitting in a darkened cinema, I realized that what they managed to achieve is far more impressive. Several hundred people – from six to sixty - were entertained and enthralled for a full 90 minutes. There are very few recent movies, very few movies ever made, that can make the same claim…

P.S. The Presto short at the beginning is rather excellent too. A suberbly animated and insanely energetic tex avery style short.
Enjoy

:)


Wall-E's introduction was one of the best teaser trailers in recent memory.