Gutsy “kid’s” movie WALL•E offers more than inconvenient truths

By Pat Stinson
Sun contributor
South of Lake Leelanau, a white gull glides in an empty sky once filled with flocks of arching wings and high-pitched calls. Beneath him, grouse feast on thousands of berries from invasive autumn olive bushes sold by a government agency that now knows better. Nearby, an eight-point buck and his doe hide in a monoculture of spruce that replaced the cherry trees cut when the land was divided for upscale homes. A homeowner with a small child wonders whether pesticides from the former orchard linger in the soil or water

We can connect the dots ourselves, from our personal observations, rely on media reports to incrementally feed us the bad news, or let an artist’s interpretation spark awareness during a visit to a gallery or movie theater.
This summer, a Hollywood children’s film sparked both awareness and controversy when it opened to rave reviews from the likes of the Washington Post and Rolling Stone. At the same time, bloggers were denouncing its anti-corporate, anti-consumerism message. The movie is the Walt Disney/Pixar animated film, WALL•E, part children’s movie, part science fiction, with a brilliantly-scripted story that entertains audiences without frightening them to death with its message: unplug and wake up, or we’ll lose our minds and bodies to the buy, buy, buy that bombards us.

Really, though, the movie is a visual and auditory treat for children and adults, with a cute, rusty garbage compactor named WALL•E as a protagonist; a shiny, smooth robot from space as his love interest; sly references to sci-fi movies and TV shows of the last 40 years; a goofy score of plucked strings and a solo oboe; and heroes and villains from humankind and other kind. Be forewarned, the film’s opening moments are dark, with bleak visuals of a future filled with crumbling expressways, garbage piled to the sky, and fierce windstorms. There’s not much conversation, either. Where are all of the humans? They escaped the pollution over 700 years ago in a corporate spaceship that takes them to the stars and feeds them constant media messages from the “Tube” and food through a tube. The inhabitants travel through the ship on hovercraft chairs, totally oblivious of their surroundings. There’s love and hope among the ruins and the humans, though, and enough child-like animation and humor to charm the kiddies.

If you missed WALL•E this summer at the Carmike theaters, or during the special showing at the State Theatre last month, you can add it to your permanent collection on November 18 when it’s released on DVD and Blu-Ray.