Wall-E (2008)
Director
Andrew Stanton
Writer
Andrew Stanton & Jim Capobianco
Cast
Voices of Ben Burtt, Elissa Knight, Jeff Garlin and Sigourney Weaver
Wall-E as been hyped for some time and I've been hyping it in my own head. After a string of some-what less-than-stellar films from Pixar, which I mean not totally flawless, I was really wanting something that captured me like The Incredibles and Toy Story. Yea, I guess Ratatouille, Cars and Finding Nemo just didn't go that far for me although I find the among the best animated features from their respective years.
I won't waste time with a synopsis as everyone and their dogs alread knows what it's about. A fish-out-of-water tales of a lonely robot in the ruins of what used to be Earth and in the mean time shows humans how to live again.
The only complain I've been hearing from the movie is that the "message" was overbearing. Sure, it doesn't hide it but I would never call it overbearing. First off, it's a family film so they are not going to hide meaningful messages for people to discover on multiple veiwings. This is what irks me about movie-buffs; sure it's nice to have those films in which you discover meanings yourself, but not every film has that nor should it. Secondly, compared to some family films the message in Wall-E is much more subtle which isn't saying much.
Wall-E's execution is fantastic. Pixar really captures the vastness of space and the animation is obviously superb but you really notice it in a film with very little dialogue. Good portions of the film play-out like a silent film which seems extremely ironic with the most advanced animation technology. Much of the film relies on physical comedy which made me chuckle quite a bit which rarely happens during animated family films.
I haven't seen Kung-Fu Panda, but it looks like a good animated film. One thing that bothers me though is that every voice actor is already a well-known and established star with a cast like Jack Black, Angelina Jolie, Dustin Hoffman and Seth Rogan (enough with Seth Rogen already!) when in an animated film... it just doesn't matter. It can become distracting as you recognize their voices and just see the actor, not the character. Also, they dominate the world of film, do they really need to do the same in the world of animation?
Thankfully this isn't the case for Wall-E. Sure there isn't a whole lot of dialogue but atleast the main characters aren't voiced by hot property actors such as Jonah Hill but by uknowns. I didn't even know who the voices were before I checked for this review. I noticed Jeff Garlin from Curb Your Enthusiasm and a nice little nod to sci-fi fans casting Sigourney Weaver who's well-known for her work in the original Alien franchise.
Not only is this a great family film this may be the greatest science-fiction film of the decade. There haven't been many released this decade that can compete with Wall-E. The Matrix sequel? Give me a break. Minority Report? Not even close. Star Wars? As much as I love them, hell nah. A.I.? Although I like it, still not even close. Maybe James Cameron's Avatar, which comes out in 2009 also starring Sigourney Weaver, will give Wall-E a run for it's money.
As of now, I feel this is Pixar's most amitious, intriguing and heart-felt effort and is destined to become a classic.
10/10
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