Your Guide to WALL-E

by aliciak - July 04, 2008

Rate Guide (4)

8 discussions

The last time I fell in love with an animated character was in the 90's when I watched X-Men. Wolverine, anyone? Yeah. Before that, it was a strange attraction to Gogo Dodo in Tiny Toon Adventures. I can't quite explain that one, but he did say "It's been surreal" a lot, which scored points in my book. Anyway! Wall-E. I mean, Waaaaaall-EEEEE. Best movie I have seen in a long, long time, and one that occupied my thoughts for an entire weekend afterward.

The Lowdown on Wall-E

I’m not going to summarize or spoil the movie, but let me say this: I haven’t felt this affected, in my heart and mind, from a movie, one without real, live human characters at that, for quite a while.

There are all the themes that are relevant (love, loneliness, environmental awareness, companionship), but rather than try to pinpoint what makes it so great, I’ll just tell you to go see it, consume it, feel it.

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The Interpunct

That little dot in “Wall-E?” Not a hyphen, but an interpunct! And being the linguistics gal that I am, I thought I’d do a little educating amidst all this entertaining. Its origins are Latin, and it just may be the first piece of punctuation to show boundaries between words or letters. (Words ran together otherwise) Nowadays, you’ll see the interpunct in computerese and math-related things, but I bet you didn’t know what it was called!

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The Sounds of Wall-E

Beyond the obvious need for an animated film to be visually appealing, sound is also important for the full experience. Pixar always does both well, but Wall-E really takes the cake.

The weekend after I saw it, I kept recreating the “clink” sound of Wall-E’s hands going together, as well as their overall melancholy look. So sad, and yet, so good!

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Wall-E + Eve

I don’t want to tear up like a girl here, but Wall-E and Eve make my Top 10 Cinematic Couples list for sure. She’s a total bad-ass, he’s a sensitive, cautious and timid robot who just wants to hold her metal hand!

I couldn’t help but see parallels in my own life, and thus, the movie took on a deeper meaning for me in terms of relationships, wooing, and that precarious “getting to know you” stretch of time that is wrought with uncertainty, excitement and fear. And she comes around in the end, the look on her “face” priceless when she sees the footage of what Wall-E did while she was in her comatose state. Awwww.

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The NYTimes Review

A.O. Scott reviews Wall-E, and as usual, interprets and reacts to films a hundred times more succinctly and intelligently than I ever could. In other words, the movie is “a cinematic poem of such wit and beauty that its darker implications may take a while to sink in.”

“It is, undoubtedly, an earnest (though far from simplistic) ecological parable, but it is also a disarmingly sweet and simple love story, Chaplinesque in its emotional purity.”

Seriously, how does he do that?

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Discussions

: by LosAngelesCitysearch 09/25/2008 Reply

When is this movie coming out in Video? I can’t wait to see it.

: by AlexandraF 07/18/2008 Reply

Who wouldn’t love those eyes!?

: by Mitch.Kocen 07/15/2008 Reply

Such a fantastic movie. You forgot to talk about all the controversy surrounding the movie. Not to spoil, but conservatives, liberals and fat people all feel this movie is attacking them.

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About The Author

aliciak

Tribeca, New York

I like to: crochet, eat, read, write, go to museums, watch old movies, cook, bake, observe children, visit the library, travel, cut my own hair, explore New York, mix gin drinks, bike ride, take photographs, keep in touch with people, be crafty, swim in the ocean, make bets, and read blogs and ca...