For years, I’ve been waiting for Disney-Pixar to disappoint me. I figured the studio that has brought us Toy Story, A Bugs Life, Cars and Finding Nemo among others was bound to put out a real stinker at some point. After watching Wall – E on Blu-ray, my stinker watch has ended and I’m about ready to declare Disney-Pixar the best movie studio in action today.
Director/writer Andrew Stanton, along with fellow screenwriter Jim Reardon, found a way to make us care about a trash-compacting robot whose attitude toward work and life might even provide a little inspiration for humans. The film obviously hopes to inspire people to take better care of the earth and consume less.
Stanton had come up for the idea of Wall – E before Toy Story (1995) for which he helped write the story and screenplay was made. Stanton’s idea was, “What if mankind evacuated Earth and forgot to turn off the last remaining robot?” It was with that basic idea that Wall – E was born. The little trash compactor has been toiling away for hundreds of years on a deserted and environmentally wasted Earth where piles of garbage and wreckage are stacked sky-high. Tasked with organizing and compressing these towering piles of garbage in an effort to clean up the waste and excesses that have destroyed life and forced humans to abandon the planet, Wall – E is committed to doing the job, even though he has no supervisors looking over his shoulder.
The film’s opening scenes set up the story well. We learn of Earth’s demise, while we are simultaneously shown Wall – E going about his Daily routine. It is made perfectly clear that Wall – E is the last surviving robot of his kind, while his brothers are broken down and spread across the desolate landscape. Fortunately, they provide the appropriate parts to help Wall-E continuously repair himself. It’s also clear at this point that Wall-E’s hundreds of years of solitude have allowed him to develop a personality. His only friend is a cockroach who acts as his pet and follows him around as he stacks garbage and collects trinkets from the rubble. Wall – E has turned his ramshackle home into a cozy place to display his trinkets and watch an old VHS tape of Hello Dolly. Regardless of how bad things are, like the Dwarfs in Disney’s first full-length animated feature, this little guy basically whistles while he works, though conditions that would make most of us just want to give up.
The Earth Wall -E is forced to face every day is less than kind. There are sudden, violent storms. But Wall – E being who he is, takes the time to watch Hello Dolly, yet again. Then one day, a rocket ship lands, dropping off a high-tech flying robot probe that’s been sent to Earth to check for signs of plant life. For Wall – E, its love at first sight; EVE on the other hand, is much more cautious. She’s also a bit trigger happy. Any sudden movements and this girl blasts away. It’s a credit to the filmmakers that they created a love story that involved robots with such vastly different personalities. It gives the film nice romantic tension viewers likely wouldn’t have suspected from robots.
As it turns out, Earth has been a trash heap for 700 years and humans have been living in a spaceship waiting for the clean-up to be finished. Well, with one tiny robot slaving away, that’s going to take quite awhile. People in the future do nothing but sit in movable beach chairs and suck down whatever food and drink is handed to them, watch whatever propaganda is displayed on individual screens before them, and atrophy in a blissful state of ignorance. George Orwell would not be shocked.
Themes abound in Wall – E. the importance of environmental responsibility, the wastefulness of human excess and the squandering of resources. However, Wall – E has a spiritual angle as well. While the film doesn’t deal directly with religion, it does touch on one particularly intriguing aspect of Wall – E’s personality: His soul. He’s more than a collection of quirky behaviors and eccentricities. Wall – E’s soul, heart or whatever you want to call it, clearly exists in the film beyond any mechanical or electronic parts that he contains. Wall – E represents the very essence of humanity in a world where humanity has lost its way.
Wall – E is another triumph for Disney-Pixar and it will definitely be on my list of the top ten DVDs of the year. Whether you buy Wall – E on Blu-ray or standard definition DVD, it’s a must-own for the whole family. Wall -E is loveable and fun but the film just might provoke some serious thought and discussion around the dinner table.
Disney and Pixar have brought Wall – E to home theaters on Blu-ray in yet another of their remarkable direct to digital transfers. As is the case with digitally created movies, no film was used in the transfer process and as a result, we are treated to pristine and flawless video performance. Wall-E is presented in its original theatrical aspect ratio of 2.40:1 and has been given a high-bitrate transfer using the AVC / Mpeg-4 codec that frequently maxes out the limits of Blu-ray video capabilities. As one would expect from a Pixar film, the results are simply stunning.
As if not to be outdone by its tremendous video presentation quality, Wall – E includes a masterful, reference-grade audio mix. Presented in 5.1 DTS HD-Master Audio, Wall – E features a lively surround experience that is completely immersive and involving. Wall – E is a film with plenty of quiet passages, so don’t expect to be rocked out of your seat for a solid 90 minutes. There are plenty of opportunities present in Wall – E for more atmospheric passages where Thomas Newman’s outstanding score takes center stage as well as haunting scenes of near silence where Earth’s desolate wind blows in the distance. However, when the action heats up, be prepared for extreme low frequency bass and an abundance of surround activity.
There are two discs here packed full of material (plus a third disc with Digital Copy) and this is another fine example of quantity and quality. All video materials are presented in full 1080 video, and subtitle options are offered in English on the video-based materials.
• Audio Commentary – The standard DVD edition of Wall – E includes an audio commentary with director Andrew Stanton. That commentary is presented here in a Cine-Explore mode that also includes picture-in-picture visual information. There’s an option to switch off the visuals, however and listen to the audio-only portion. As the commentary with Stanton is identical on the DVD and Blu-ray versions, check out the exclusives section below for a review of the track.
• Short Film: “Burn•E” (HD, 7 minutes) – A animated and whimsical Pixar short is included, called “Burn•E.” The short is also viewable in a PIP mode that includes running storyboards for the entire short.
• Short Film (HD, 5 minutes) – An additional Pixar short is included, for an imaginative and visually-gorgeous little magician’s tale called “Presto.”
• Theatrical Trailers (HD) – There are a ton of trailers for other Disney titles, including ‘Pinocchio,’ ‘The Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian,’ ‘Earth’ and ‘Tinker Bell and the Lost Treasure,’ as well as a ‘Disney Parks’ promo spot.
Disc Two:
The extras on disc two are divided into two sections, first “Robots,” then “Humans.” All materials are in full 1080 HD, with English, French and Spanish Dolby Digital 2.0 Stereo and subtitle options.
• Deleted Scenes (HD, 23 minutes) – The “Humans” section kicks off with four scenes here, which you can play individually or as a group (with introduction by Stanton). The scenes are a mix of wholly completed and rendered scenes, and some in more raw states of completion. The four scenes are: “Garbage Airlock,” “Dumper,” “Secret Files,” and “Docking.”
• “Behind-the-Scenes” Featurettes (HD, 9 minutes) – This three-part documentary gives us a fairly thorough visual overview of the conception and production of Wall – E. Interviews with Stanton and most of the main Pixar crew are intercut with extensive making-of footage shot during the story development, animation, and post-production processes. “The Imperfect Lens: Creating the Look of Wall – E” (14 minutes) covers the beginning stages of visual design. “Animation Sound Design: Building Worlds from the Sound Up” (19 minutes) dissects the creation of the film’s entire soundtrack, which was constructed completely in the studio. Finally, “Captain’s Log: The Evolution of Humans” (8 minutes) goes in-depth into the conceptualization and rendering of the film’s human characters.
• BnL Shorts (HD, 9 minutes) – Full-length versions of the three short films watched by Wall – E in the film are presented here uncut and fully-animated. The three shorts are: “Captaining the Axiom,” “Operation Cleanup” and “Meet the BnL Bots.”
• Gallery (HD) – These extensive still galleries are divided into four sections: “Character Design,” “Layouts & Backgrounds,” “Visual Development” and “Publicity.” The images are quite extensive, and including both conceptual art and more fully-rendered drawings. In total, I counted over a hundred different images. (Note there is also a “Play All” function that will automatically advance you through all the stills in the gallery.)
• Documentary: “The Pixar Story” (HD, 88 minutes) – Curiously, the best extra of this entire set is practically hidden in the disc’s menus. It’s in the “Humans” section, but on a second page that you have to scroll down to even access — is Pixar trying to hide it?) Directed by Academy Award-winning filmmaker Leslie Iwerks, this is a fantastic documentary on the history of Pixar Studios. I bet Disney could easily have sold this as its own Blu-ray release — it’s really that aweaome. The entire birth and growth of the company is chronicled, from their beginnings in 1979, through early experimental shorts and commercials, to the juggernaut we know now today. Fresh interviews are included with all of Pixar’s chief artists, as well as such luminaries as Roy Disney, Tom Hanks and Steve Jobs.
• Vignette: “Wall – E’s Treasures & Trinkets” (HD, 5 minutes) – The “Robots” section begins with this oddity.
• Sneak Peek : “Wall – E’s Tour of the Universe” (HD, 1 minute) – This mock preview spot is a cute promo for the walle.com website.
• Bot Storybook (HD) – A sort of bizarre, animated interactive game, this can be viewed as a short stand-alone montage, or a “Play Along” mode allowing you to interact with the visuals on the screen.
• Bot Files (HD) – This is essentially a still gallery, with individual animated visual files for 28 different robots seen in the film. Each robot gets a 360-degree visual spin of the robot, with a narrator filling us in on some interesting facts about the machine.
• Trailers (HD) – Finally, four trailers for Wall – E are included – three domestic, and one French-Canadian promo.
Disc Three:
• Digital Copy – Finally, a third DVD disc is offered that contains a DisneyFile (aka Digital Copy) version of the film in 480p standard-definition. The DisneyFile copy is compatible with PCs, PSP and iTunes
