Wall-E

[J vs W]

I saw wall-e and i wanted to read what you guys said about it but the thread is gone! Total bummer :(

[punkdc]

I love it the more I thought about it. I remember walking out thinking "It was alright" but the next morning when I woke up I was just in love with it.

[smartbunny]

AMAZING attention to detail. I cannot comprehend how they render all of that artwork. It's mindblowing.

[TimBuktu]

really great. really, really great.

[Matt Braunger]

The "Wall-E theory" (courtesy of Ill Doctrine):
<object width="425" height="344"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/saFJ4xSfrb8&hl=en&fs=1"></param><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"></param><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/saFJ4xSfrb8&hl=en&fs=1" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowfullscreen="true" width="425" height="344"></embed></object>
Funny stuff.

[smartbunny]

I thought the same thing about the people on the ship (although I got the feeling it did not cost anything to live on Axiom Starliner, everyone was kind of "sent" to it by the corporation). But everyone shown was white and American.

[Michael Blacklist]

But everyone shown was white and American.

Not so. There were a few black people (and a baby) as well as both a black and Asian captain.

[smartbunny]

OK so not everyone.

[Berliner]

Not so. There were a few black people (and a baby) as well as both a black and Asian captain.

That (very roughly) correlates to American demographics. When I saw it, I figured all the other countries were left to die.

It's not really any weirder than the fact that most American sci-fi shows/movie seem to have mostly whites in their spaceships, with a few hints at ethnic diversity. Other countries' sci fi movies are going to be heavily populated with their own race, even if its supposed to be a global future.

[Babs]

Just saw it last night...the first 20 minutes or so just completely blew me away. I mean the artwork/animation is second to none I believe. I had some issues with the plot, I just didn't really buy the love story that much I guess (they are still robots after all) and the fat lazy people thing was obviously beat over your head a billion times. great stuff but maybe I was too hyped up going in.

[Jack]

Here's a pretty cool article from USA Today (http://www.usatoday.com/life/movies/news/2008-07-01-wall-e-breaks-the-rules_n.htm) that touches on a few issues presented in the plot, but never really addressed directly regarding the choice to mix humans with CGI.

Why Fred Willard was live action; as opposed to animated:
Casting a real actor helped balance out WALL·E's other pastime — watching a video of Hello, Dolly!.

"It was born out of necessity," Stanton says. "I had WALL·E watching an old movie, which forced me to show footage of real human beings, and it set a precedent: Any time you look at old footage, it should be regular human beings."

And why humans are humans in the first half yet CGI blobs in the second half.
When WALL·E encounters the spaceship humans, they are big blobs from a combination of laziness, overeating and zero-gravity. "I made that the dividing line," Stanton says. "They've changed 700 years later to look like big babies so I can make them CG."

Also an excellent episode of Fresh Air (http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=92400669) where Terry Gross goes into even more detail with Andrew Stanton where it's clear he's going to be the Pixar guy known for blending live-action and humans in future Pixar films:
These days, Stanton is working on John Carter of Mars, and adaptation of Edward Rice Burroughs' Barsoom series. The film will differ from previous Pixar releases in that it will blend CGI animation with live-action footage. The film is slated to be released in 2012.

[Harry Bongers]

Saw it and loved it. It was sweet and charming. I really don't understand how anyone could have the experience compromised by noticing the incongruity of having live action humans appear on the television.

[TimBuktu]

Saw it and loved it. It was sweet and charming. I really don't understand how anyone could have the experience compromised by noticing the incongruity of having live action humans appear on the television.

I agree, it didn't bother me in the slightest.

[Jack]

I really don't understand how anyone could have the experience compromised by noticing the incongruity of having live action humans appear on the television.

Who ever said said the experience was "compromised"? It's a great movie! The live/CGi stuff an interesting quirk and interesting to explore—and hear the movie's creators explicitly discuss and explore—the fact they themselves were a bit apprehensive about it working at all. In lesser hands it most likely would have failed.

[Me!]

I might see it today!

[tockxie]

AMAZING attention to detail. I cannot comprehend how they render all of that artwork. It's mindblowing.

This is exactly half of what I have to say about Wall-E. The other half is that I think the lack of speech in main characters lessened the emotional impact of their love story and interactions in general, and that ultimately I wasn't interested enough in the conceit of the movie (I'm not a sci-fi guy, and I hate future-imperfect-because-we-didn't-love-our-planet stories) to really get into it.

Also, the nerd in me scoffs because all the music is schmaltzy showtunes and that the all-important movie-within-a-movie that teaches Wall-E lonliness is very clearly a colorized 40s musical... in spite of Wall-E taking place 700 years in the future.

That said, Fred Willard is, was, and always will be the Bomb.

[P-Dub]

I don't know what any of that has to do with being a nerd, but Hello, Dolly! was released in 1969.

[aenemaTron]

Also, the nerd in me scoffs because all the music is schmaltzy showtunes and that the all-important movie-within-a-movie that teaches Wall-E lonliness is very clearly a colorized 40s musical... in spite of Wall-E taking place 700 years in the future.

Yeah I don't get this. I won't argue about whether the lack of speech helped or hurt the story (helped, clearly, especially since the robots had no opportunity to call each other "the man" or reference 20th century pop culture) or why you'd have an automatic dislike for a specific movie plot (what other movies are like this?), but the Hello Dolly thing, what's the issue there?

[Jawa]

My apologies if you have already seen this, or if it has been linked to elsewhere on the board (it was on the old thread, maybe?), but this is a great story about Pixar being nice to a Wall-E fan.

http://betteronme.blogspot.com/2008/07/hello-luxo.html

[tockxie]

I don't know what any of that has to do with being a nerd, but Hello, Dolly! was released in 1969.

My bad, I was off by about 40 years, so Wall-E is only off by 740.

I did like how well their live action segments were integrated, though, that was a surprise. You don't realize how good Pixar's gotten until you find they can lay in actual video segments without the audience blinking an eye.

And Presto was really cute.

[yumitree]

if this were one of those message boards where you could change your screen name and then change it again/back when you get tired of it, i'd change mine to "wall-etree" right now.