Friday, July 11, 2008

My Weekend Crush

So this is my first couple crush, and it’s a tad unconventional one at that. I know I try to keep things as gay as possible here at Surrenders, but if you’ll allow me I’d like to sneak in a straight-but-not-narrow pair – just this once. Actually, I’m not really sure if they are straight. I don’t think they have any gender at all given that they are – you know – robots. But I saw “Wall•E” last weekend and fell instantly, totally, unabashedly in love. And it’s all thanks to our mechanical lovebirds, Wall•E and Eve.

The film works on so many levels: a romance, an adventure, an eco-warning and a metaphor for the human condition. It’s that last bit that takes “Wall•E” from merely insanely adorable to out-and-out genius. Like the Tin Man before him, Wall•E is every man (or woman) in search of a heart. What Wall•E wants from Eve is so simple – to hold her hand and have it held back. No, I’m not crying. I’ve got something in my eye. I swear. Really.

Bundle in the brilliant animation, limited dialogue, gentle humor and wondrous story and you have a movie that anyone from 5 to 95 could enjoy. The film’s scope is sweet and satisfying, yet not without something important to say. While laughing along with Wall•E and Eve, we see clearly through their outsider eyes the best and worst in all of us. It’s more than a tad bit ironic that a movie about machines might help us find more of our own humanity. Also, good God, they’re cute. Happy weekend, all.

12 comments:

Anonymous said...

I swear this film is going to confuse most of the UK to start off with simply by it's name & the way we pronounce 'Wall'...I guess Wall-E is supposed to end up being pronounced like the name Wally but even that has some iffy conotations in the UK (wally being another word for idiot here).

Looks cute though.

Anonymous said...

Thanks for the post!
I feel head over heals for this movie!

Great story on all levels... about love.

Heather Anne Hogan said...

Of course you know how happy this makes me!

Anonymous said...

AWW... I cried too. I'm admitting it. I really felt for Wall-E. I related to him in such a ridiculous way. All I want is to hold a girl's hand too. ^_~

Her Name is Jane said...

wall*e was definitely my favorite movie of the season. i laughed, i cried... i held my girlfriend's hand... it was amazing.

great couple... great post. =]

Anonymous said...

Really? Really? You really think the fat-people-will-kill-us-all conceit is a reasonable premise on which to base a movie? That's pretty disappointing.

I'm fat, I eat no more than most of my thinner friends, and I'm not causing the end of the world any time soon.

www.kateharding.net might help change your mind. The media isn't right on this one -- they almost never are.

Anonymous said...

I don't think that's the premise of the movie, actually.

I've seen some of the objections to the portrayal of fat humans in Wall-E, and speaking as a fat person myself, I think those folks are misreading both the text and the subtext.

Anonymous said...

i love the story between eve and wall-e, but i did not enjoy their concept of having overly obese people only portrayed in the movie. i'm a skinny person and i was uncomfortable with the concept, and they way the human race was perceived.

the whole time i kept thinking...with all this technology they cant have treadmills, healthy food etc.

i was disappointed with the movie.

Anonymous said...

This might be long, but if I may, a quote from the director

"OK, but why were the humans on the space station all fat and riding around in their hovering lounge chairs?"

Stanton: I wasn't trying to make the humans into fat, lazy consumers, but to make humanity appear to be completely consumed by everything that can distract you—to the point where they lost connection with each other, even though they're right next to each other. The reason I made them look like big babies was because a NASA guy told me that they haven't yet simulated gravity perfectly for long-term residency in space. And if they don't get it just right, atrophy kicks in and you begin to lose your muscle tone—you just turn into a blob of goo. For a while, that's what I did with the humans in the movie; they were just big blobs of Jell-O. But it was so bizarre, we had to pull it back. So I said, well, let's just make them look like big babies. That's where all that came from.

I wasn't trying to make some sort of mean-spirited comment on consumerism or today's society. I was going with just the logic of what would happen if you were in a perpetual vacation with no real purpose in life. So I went with the idea that we'd become sort of big babies with no reason to grow up. I definitely saw humanity as victims of this system that they were in. They were just big babies that needed to stand on their own two feet.

The last thing I'm going to do is try to make a message movie!

my $.02? I liked the movie

Anonymous said...

WAAALLLL-EEE
god such a cute movie :D

Anonymous said...

Wally was soo cute taking Eve on those dates...even though it did have a creepy edge to it considering she was comatose during that time...

Mop is the cutest little type A robot I've ever seen.

Anonymous said...

Wally was soo cute taking Eve on those dates...even though it did have a creepy edge to it considering she was comatose during that time...

Mop is the cutest little type A robot I've ever seen.