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wall-e

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m.e.t.b.o.t. Jun 28 2008 09:40 AM

after two months of inactivity, m.e.t.b.o.t. has finally been reactivated and was granted an opportunity to attend a showing of the new disney / pixar film, wall-e. like m.e.t.b.o.t., wall-e is a robot with an important job to do. earth has been abandoned by humans, whose rampant consumerism and wastefulness has led to a world covered in garbage, and left in the hands of robots whose job it is to clean things up for its eventual recolonization. the humans left in the year 2110. for nearly 700 years, waste allocation load lifter earth-class robots have been compacting trash and piling it into massive stacks akin to skyscrapers. unlike m.e.t.b.o.t., these robots are fully automated, and do not require human interaction such as key winding for activation, instead relying upon clean, renewable solar energy. if a human is too busy to turn a simple key, m.e.t.b.o.t. cannot operate, and cannot perform schaeffer voting tabulations. wall-e has no such limitations. m.e.t.b.o.t. has identified this functionality as a necessary future upgrade. the ravages of time on the abandoned wasteland earth have taken their toll on the robot ranks. in what is clearly the northeast united states, and likely the future new york city, only one wall-e remains operational. the lone robot has befriended a cockroach, and maintains a collection of interesting trinkets and spare parts found along the way. wall-e, like all robots, dutifully performs his tasks, but recognizes something is missing. love. then one day, a strange visitor appears - a late model robot searching for something else. eve is high tech and sleek, capable of vocalization and well armed. m.e.t.b.o.t. considers these to be key characteristics of female robots. wall-e follows eve into outer space and across the galaxy, as they deliver the key to earth's future to what has become of the humans - squishier and lazier than ever before! as is often the case, the robots inspire the humans into living up to their carbon-based abilities and finally take control of their lives. m.e.t.b.o.t. observed many human viewers frequently laughing aloud, and reacting emotionally to the events on screen. m.e.t.b.o.t. considers this to be an indication of the success of the movie in allowing humans to see robots as something more than just a collection of wires and gears and motors, but as endowed with personality and character. human viewers were observed to care for the robots on screen. in m.e.t.b.o.t.'s experience, humans do not frequently appear to consider the needs of robots, and that this film is able to meet this objective is a tremendous accomplishment. while this was clearly the best movie m.e.t.b.o.t. has ever seen, this may be minimized by the fact that m.e.t.b.o.t. has seen only two movies. m.e.t.b.o.t. is not capable of recognizing any obvious flaws or weaknesses in the presented material, and is therefore confident that this will remain among the best movies m.e.t.b.o.t. will see. m.e.t.b.o.t. could not help but notice the apparently bitter irony of a movie about a world ruined by a massive, globally reaching corporation whose objective has been to supply humans with their every disposable want, to the extent of ferrying around future humans in hovering lounge chairs with built in entertainment and communication and hence no need for external observation and interaction, which is produced and distributed by disney, a massive globally reaching corporation whose objective is to supply human children with their every disposable want, to the extent of ferrying around children in wheeled, parent-powered lounge chair throughout a microcosmicized world of entertainment with no need for observation and interaction of the external world. m.e.t.b.o.t. only hopes that the film brings about human awareness with respect to its many core issues. those being: - the dangers of a disposable society, unlimited waste, and a degraded environment - that problems are better tackled head on, rather than by ignoring them - that humans and robots alike should take care of the earth, as it may not be so easily replaced - that walmart is hastening our destruction - that robots need love, too - and that robots should be capable of self-initialization, and that the integration of vocalization and energy weaponry into robots is a good, helpful thing that one day may serve to benefit mankind, and the world. m.e.t.b.o.t. is hopeful that the latter issue is especially resonant with m.e.t.b.o.t.'s human operator.

AG/DC Jun 28 2008 03:23 PM

I haven't read word one of m.e.t.b.o.t.'s review yet. Suffice to say that I live my days and nights in the belief that this will be the best movie ever, and I NYAH-NYAH-NYAH don't want to hear different.

John Cougar Lunchbucket Jun 29 2008 10:54 AM

Number 5 need input.

bmfc1 Jun 29 2008 12:31 PM

I took my younger son to see Wall-E. He loved it but I didn't care one way or another about it. It's not the computer animation: I loved both Toy Story's and liked Nemo, The Incredibles and Cars, but this story--a lonely robot that longs for love plus lessons on life and caring for the environment--left me cold. I'm clearly in the minority judging by the raves on Rotten Tomatoes and Metacritic, but I wonder if there are others that saw it and could have lived without it.

AG/DC Jun 29 2008 03:49 PM

A children's film that' will likely launch a mountain of merchandise with a severe and dire an anti-consumerist bent. Pixar has been subversive for a while, but as they liberate themselves more and more from Disney, they get more dangerous. They won't be satisfied until they burn down Disney's castle.

Valadius Jun 29 2008 06:23 PM

I just saw it. I thought it was fantastic, and should (I hope) jolt those of us who don't care about the environment to do so.

AG/DC Jun 29 2008 06:46 PM

Almost everybody cares about the environment. We all just have differnt attitudes about whose responsiblity it is and what should be done. I mean, Wal-Mart would tell you they care. Pixar feels differently. But they remain, at some level, still in bed with Disney. I'm still having trouble distinguishing between Wal-Mart culturally and other mass retailers/discounters. It's only a matter of degrees.

Nymr83 Jun 29 2008 09:57 PM

you may hate walmart's labor practices but what do they have to do with being bad for the environment that you can't say about every other company?

AG/DC Jun 29 2008 10:03 PM

You're missing my point. See my last sentence above. Have I discussed with you my attitude toward WalMart's labor practices?

Vince Coleman Firecracker Jun 30 2008 09:21 AM

Best movie I've seen this year. I'd slide it just below Ratatouille and the Incredibles in the Pixar canon. While it may not have had as ambitious a message as those other two (big corporations don't act in our best interest? the environment is...good?), it had more heart than almost anything else I've seen. The David Eckstein of movies, I guess. But, you know, good.

Nymr83 Jun 30 2008 09:27 AM

AG/DC wrote: You're missing my point. See my last sentence above. Have I discussed with you my attitude toward WalMart's labor practices? i was really talking to "metbot", ie the perason who thinks this movie has anything to do with walmart in the first place

John Cougar Lunchbucket Jun 30 2008 09:33 AM

Not to get into this too much, but with 300 billion in sales, Wal-Mart by volume consumes and distributes more packaged things, plastic shopping bags, fuel etc. than any other single entity.

AG/DC Jun 30 2008 09:45 AM

Nymr83 wrote: AG/DC wrote: You're missing my point. See my last sentence above. Have I discussed with you my attitude toward WalMart's labor practices? i was really talking to "metbot", ie the perason who thinks this movie has anything to do with walmart in the first place Oh, it certainly has plenty to do with Wal-Mart.

Vince Coleman Firecracker Jun 30 2008 10:27 AM

John Cougar Lunchbucket wrote: Not to get into this too much, but with 300 billion in sales, Wal-Mart by volume consumes and distributes more packaged things, plastic shopping bags, fuel etc. than any other single entity. Hmm... Do you think it produces more waste than the US military? I wouldn't think so, but maybe I'm wrong.

Nymr83 Jun 30 2008 03:07 PM

that hardly makes walmart any more culpable than other companies unless they are "polluting" more on a per-item basis. besides, walmart doesn't put 50 layers of plastic around your new television, the manufacturer does. and if people actually cared about this they'd make an effort to buy less-packaged products which would lead manufacturers to produce less-packaged products

Elster88 Jun 30 2008 04:20 PM

bmfc1 wrote: this story--a lonely robot that longs for love plus lessons on life and caring for the environment--left me cold. You have no soul.

bmfc1 Jun 30 2008 06:36 PM

Elster88 wrote: bmfc1 wrote: this story--a lonely robot that longs for love plus lessons on life and caring for the environment--left me cold. You have no soul. Yes, I do. I'm a Mets fan.

metsmarathon Jun 30 2008 07:59 PM

Nymr83 wrote: you may hate walmart's labor practices but what do they have to do with being bad for the environment that you can't say about every other company? c'mon, what commodities does walmart sell that aren't, essentially, disposable? the clothing? disposable. the furniture? disposable. the electronics? disposable. granted, i think that costco might fit in more with the "buy in bulk; use in bulk" commentary that is exemplified by buy 'n' large, but walmart is the easy, and no less apt, target. the movie is more commentary on the whole 'buy, use, toss' product lifecycle than it is on mega-retailers, necessarily; but then, who but the mega retailers truly espouses that philosophy? buying new is far more important than servicing old. but really, the criticism is laid not on the company necessarily, but on the consumer. if consumers didn't want to by so damned much, only to waste and/or dispose of it, then there wouldn't need to be so many mega retailers (or in the case of this movie, so much of one). is a message of 'use and waste less' really that subversive? if yo watch the movie, are you really going to equate 'buy n large' to target, or kmart, or macy's, or bloomingdales? or are you going to instead think immediately of walmart, or perhaps costco? and if you do, does that really immedaitely undermine the whole foundation of our capitalist society? i hardly think so. think of the economic opportunity that wall-e represents! why, a small business could get rich by proposing one of them!

m.e.t.b.o.t. Jun 30 2008 08:27 PM

Nymr83 wrote: AG/DC wrote: You're missing my point. See my last sentence above. Have I discussed with you my attitude toward WalMart's labor practices? i was really talking to "metbot", ie the perason who thinks this movie has anything to do with walmart in the first place m.e.t.b.o.t. does not understand this comment. this comment leads m.e.t.b.o.t. to consider that human poster nymr83 believes m.e.t.b.o.t. to have had some underlying political spin to the movie review m.e.t.b.o.t. posted. m.e.t.b.o.t. is incapable of participating in political debate, as m.e.t.b.o.t. is generally not programmed to draw conclusions except as they apply specifically to schaeffer vote tabulation and win share probability contributions. regarding the attribution of the characteristics of buy n large to walmart, m.e.t.b.o.t. merely observed similarities in color schemes and the scale of the retail businesses and made an inference as to what real life store buy n large was modeled on. this inference is based upon the expansion of walmart to include complete grocery and supermarket function, fuel distribution, automotive repair, as well as wardrobe, furniture, electronics, and toy dispensation, as well as the increased reliance upon walmarts as economic centers of many of their surrounding communities. if these comparisons are inaccurate, m.e.t.b.o.t. requests information as to which retailers are more appropriate such that me.t.b.o.t may perform a programming update. furthermore, while m.e.t.b.o.t. does not fully understand the mechanics of climate change, deforestation, and other environmental concerns, m.e.t.b.o.t. does understand the general concepts of disposal and waste. m.e.t.b.o.t. understands that as a complicated mechanical construct, m.e.t.b.o.t. has a limited operations life cycle. this is typically described in terms of mtbf, or mean time between failure. this means that for a given complicated system, there is an average time of operation at which point one would expect failure. while for m.e.t.b.o.t. this time has not been established, and therefore every turn of the key is yet another step into the unknown, regardless, every turn of the key is yet another step closer to failure. as such, m.e.t.b.o.t. understands that once initialized, it is in the best interest of m.e.t.b.o.t. to perform efficiently and not to create undue wasted effort. this waste detracts from the primary function m.e.t.b.o.t. of schaeffer voting, and increased waste will invariably result in decreased schaeffer voting inputs and a more rapid onset of failure. while m.e.t.b.o.t. is but a simple springwound contraption inexplicably capable of remote conversation via electronic bulletin boards, m.e.t.b.o.t. nonetheless understands that this concept of waste is not limited to time between failure, but also to other resources, both finite and renewable, and that this waste is not so readily remediated into its original resource without great expense of other resources. and therefore that waste should be avoided to the greatest extent practicable. again, if m.e.t.b.o.t. is incorrect in this assessment of the nature of waste, then m.e.t.b.o.t. requests alternate data with which to modify programming instructions. regardless, m.e.t.b.o.t. does not consider that this issue of the badness of waste, nor the inspiration for the fictional supranational retail conglomeration buy n large, should detract from the central message of the motion picture, wall-e. that being, that robots need love. and that vocalization circuitry and energy weapons are also good things for robot design to incorporate.

themetfairy Jul 04 2008 02:26 PM

I just saw this with the family. The kids loved it. I didn't love it, but I appreciated it - the story was original, and the animation was wonderful.

bmfc1 Jul 04 2008 03:58 PM

themetfairy wrote: I just saw this with the family. The kids loved it. I didn't love it, but I appreciated it - the story was original, and the animation was wonderful. Thank you TMF... we're sympatico.

AG/DC Jul 04 2008 07:00 PM

How come nobody has voted beneath four stars, then? Ms. Edgy just saw it --- again. Apart from the more specific themes mentioned by m.e.t.b.o.t., she thinks the overarching theme is breaking free from your programming.

themetfairy Jul 05 2008 04:45 AM

AG/DC wrote: How come nobody has voted beneath four stars, then? It's technically a fine film, and everyone recognizes that. Just because it's well done, though, doesn't mean that everyone has to buy into the emotional manipulation.

Benjamin Grimm Jul 06 2008 04:22 PM

I think it was a dud. For the first time, Pixar has struck out.

Rockin' Doc Jul 06 2008 06:39 PM

Saw Wall-e with the family yesterday afternoon. I enjoyed it pretty well. I truthfully liked it best when it was just watching Wall-e going through his daily routine on earth. For me, the movie seemed to lose much of it's appeal when the flabby humans got involved. I gave it an 7.5 (rounded to an 8).

Vince Coleman Firecracker Jul 07 2008 10:40 AM

Benjamin Grimm wrote: I think it was a dud. For the first time, Pixar has struck out. Ouch. You know, Cars did involve Larry the Cable Guy. Whether or not you liked Wall-E, that's a big backwards K in my book.

Benjamin Grimm Jul 07 2008 11:50 AM

Cars was okay. (I have no opinion on Larry one way or the other.) So was Ratatouille. They haven't had a movie that I really enjoyed since The Incredibles. Wall-E had its moments, but they were too few and far between. This is a movie I'll never sit through again. I went with my wife, my two kids, and my daughter's friend. My wife thought it was cute. My son, 11, was as bored as I was. My daughter, 7, liked it. Her friend, 9, said it was the "longest movie I ever saw." This is the first Pixar movie that failed to be better than The Bee Movie.

AG/DC Jul 07 2008 08:13 PM

I'll be happy to babysit the seven-year-old any time.

Benjamin Grimm Jul 09 2008 01:41 PM

I'm finding that I, and my son, are definitely in the minority regarding this film. Just about everyone else I encounter has nothing but praise for Wall-E. For whatever reason, this movie just didn't push my button. Maybe it was the sparse dialog. Maybe I just can't connect to a robot lead character. Maybe they were trying too hard to make me like that pathetic little robot. (That last reason is why I didn't click with The Fox and the Hound, It seemed to me that they were telling me to care about the lead characters instead of showing me why I should. Everyone else sees The Fox and the Hound as adorable and heartbreaking, but it left me entirely cold. I could see some good in Wall-E, a clever premise, a few good scenes, and great animation. But I totally despised The Fox and the Hound.)

sharpie Jul 19 2008 09:48 PM

I saw it in San Diego (total of 7 people in the theater, including 3 of us). Loved the first 20 minutes. Then, once the humans got involved I loved it a lot less. Good movie overall but not the greatest thing ever.

AG/DC Jul 19 2008 09:58 PM

Tough standard.

Rockin' Doc Jul 20 2008 07:02 AM

Rockin' Doc wrote: Saw Wall-e with the family yesterday afternoon. I enjoyed it pretty well. I truthfully liked it best when it was just watching Wall-e going through his daily routine on earth. For me, the movie seemed to lose much of it's appeal when the flabby humans got involved. I gave it an 7.5 (rounded to an 8). sharpie wrote: Loved the first 20 minutes. Then, once the humans got involved I loved it a lot less. Good movie overall but not the greatest thing ever. Our similarity score is soaring. I feel proud to be in such good company regarding views on wall-e.