MDF(smash)

About that Wall-e “love story”

So, I finally saw Wall-e…

(yeah, screw you)

And I thought it was great. You have to have huge balls to put out a full feature-length film with about as much dialogue in it as an Elizabeth Bishop poem. I liked most everything about it but it wasn’t the pure love story I thought it was supposed to be (warning: minor plot spoilers ahead that you should probably know happen by now anyway).

So, ignore the fact that this is a love story developing between two (genderless?) futurist robots, and just think about how their relationship evolves alongside the plot of the movie. What if you were watching a love story and it’s about this guy, all alone on a planet, say Will Smith in I am Legend style (the little bug is the dog to Walle’s Smith), just doing his job, biding his time. And then out of nowhere a female lands in the scene.

Nevermind this could be the ugliest chick you’ve ever seen, there have been literally NO options on this lifeless planet existence of yours, and you’re going to check her out. So after some preliminary stalking and lusting from afar, the boy approaches the girl and convinces her to come check out his place (helps if you have an imminent dust storm coming down hard). Once there he’s trying to impress her with his tv and collection of musicals on dvd. When that fails, he whips out his archive of knick-knacks. All of the spare parts in the world wouldn’t impress this chick until you pull out your pet plant.

The girl takes one hit off your plant and shuts down. Literally. Up to this point, other than short R2D2-like exchanges and one offer of hand-holding refused, the guy and the girl have as much of a blossoming relationship as Natalie Portman and myself. However, that doesn’t stop Wall-e. This is the first, and perhaps last, chick he imagines he’ll encounter and he wants his romance, damnit.

So, with no other choice, Walle goes “Weekend at Bernie’s” with her. It’s about as creepy and pathetic as it gets to watch Walle drag her lifeless corpse around his dead planet and play “dating” with her. Prop her up for a fake dinner. Carry her to the couch for some tv. Push her around for a “walk.” The only way Walle could be having more fun is if it were consensual.

Finally her parents realize she’s been missing for months and come to get her. A strange transport arrives and pulls her in with some tractor beam Walle has never seen, but none the less, he jumps on for the ride. He hasn’t talked with “Eve” since he whipped out that plant and is now stowing away on her ship. That’s a pretty big chance to take, but Walle sees the only piece of ass leaving his planet and figures it’s worth drifting through space forever even if it doesn’t end up working out.

Once on board he spends the whole time looking for this one chick he’s exchanged two “beeps” with, ignoring the new assortment of lady robots parading naked around him. He eventually catches up with this girl, now awake, and she could seemingly care less about him. She’s got a directive and he’s got a hard on for stalking.

How is this a love story? Any other movie, the guy would be locked up by now. It’s only after the chick goes through her surveillance videos (super romantic) and sees Walle playing with her lifeless body that she chooses to be wooed instead of disgusted and appalled. And the whole love story Pixar presents in Walle is leaning on that fine line. Ridiculous. But somehow, they pulled THAT off, portrayed every human as sickeningly fat and useless, and ran for two hours on four minutes of vocal exposition. Well played, Pixar, well played.