I saw Wall-E, a Pixar film that premiered this weekend. It was all that you would expect, visually engaging, innovative story telling, and humor that will satisfy child and adult alike. Wall-E (Waste Allocator Load Lifter-Earth Class) doesn’t talk nor does his pet cockroach, the only two survivors on an otherwise lifeless planet Earth. But Wall-E’s robotic coos and pantomime make it clear what he is feeling and the movie is filled with  sentimental scores that add a heighten sense of emotional to an otherwise completely automated environment.

And yes, Wall-E is quite a sentimental robot.  He gets his feelings hurt, worries about treading over his cockroach and… even falls in love with Eve (Extraterrestrial Vegetation Evaluator), who comes to Earth to see what shape it’s in. She is cold and calculating at first but she soon falls for Wall-E’s earnest mechanical heart. All the robots in the movie gush with emotions, which made me wanted to roll my eyes a few times. Then some all too clever, culturally relevant bit of ‘Pixar humor’ would draw me back in.

Don’t expect to walk away from this movie without some not-so-subtle social and political commentary. We are big-box-loving-self-absorbed-dim-witted-earth-killers…And you should know it. I laughed aloud when the ship’s CEO insisted that we ‘Stay the course’. A little self-deprecation is good for the soul.

Make sure to stay for the first part of credits, if you are one of those people like me who likes neat little extras.

Rating: See it