While I was away from the blog, I saw the film Wall-E twice. The first time, it's not an exaggeration to say that I cried for at least 45 minutes of the movie. The second time, maybe 5 minutes. Clearly a better situation. However, I can't say that the second time, I was actually less sad than the first. I still thought (and think) that the movie was sad in ways that I'm not sure it was meant to be. I've thought about it quite a bit, because my reaction was so incredibly extreme, and there has to be a reason. If you haven't seen the movie, and you plan on it, you probably shouldn't read further, because I am going to talk about the film in specific terms.
First of all, I found the beginning of the film unspeakably sad. Even though Wall-E had a cockroach friend, there was no sort of companionship in that. Wall-E is alone. When he's returning to his "home" after a long day's work, and he's zooming past what must be hundreds of dead wall-e units, my heart just drooped. It's sad, ok? He's ALONE. Clearly this solitude has enabled him to become sentient in some way; Wall-E feels, and we know it because of his reaction to the love scene in "Hello, Dolly". (Why "Hello, Dolly" is another question altogether. Seriously, Pixar, why "Hello, Dolly"?) But to me, Wall-E was essentially an innocent. Yes, he yearns for togetherness and love, but it's an innocent yearning. I didn't see much complexity to that desire, and I think that this continues thoughout the entire film. Wall-E is single-minded; he doesn't care about danger or nuance. Eve is pretty and Eve is the single thing that breaks his solitude; thus he loves her.
And this, to me, brings about the saddest few scenes in the film. The first time I saw this part, I was crying so hard that I missed parts of these scenes. The second time, I still found them as sad, but was able to control myself more. Wall-E shows Eve the plant; the plant is sucked up by Eve and she shuts down, fulfilling her purpose as a machine. Wall-E basically screams her name in robot voice (heart-breaking) and then begins to "do" things with her. He leads her around with a string of Xmas lights. He holds an umbrella over her head when it rains. He sits and watches a sunset with her. Even though she's, for all intents and purposes, dead. She doesn't know what's going on; she literally CANNOT experience the things her and Wall-E are doing "together". Bleak. Simply one of the saddest things I can imagine. My mom, by contrast, said she thought it was "cute". I can't figure out how to see these scenes as benign, and harmless, because to me, regardless of how the movie ends (and it's PIXAR, so I'm sure you can guess how, and even I KNEW WHILE WATCHING that things would most likely work out), I just can't imagine anything worse.
It's like....a coma. Only not really, because human beings are too complex for things to be so simple, as they are for Wall-E. A human would never drag their loved one's hospital bed to a sunset and watch it "with her." And ok, yes, these are machines. I get that, but I also think that Pixar is tricksy, and they're tricksy because they're making you feel for the robots as if they were humans, and they're treating the robots as humans, and you feel like they're humans, and then BOOM! The robot does something that would be so unspeakably sad for a human to do that you can't help but feel wrecked when the robot does it. That's my little analysis as to why I felt so incredibly ruined by the film, which after the first time, I did. Anytime I thought about those scenes (or heard Wall-E's "Eve" scream in my head), I got teary. Ruined.
And yet, I did see the film again, because quite frankly, it might have been one of the best films I've seen in 5 years. All the things it made me feel means it worked, right? It was beautiful and masterful. Wall-E was endearing and sweet, and the movie DID have its funny moments. Also, to be fair, no one else I know had the reaction I did, and I'm not just talking about Sam and I as being the pool of possible criers.
I don't plan on seeing the film a third time, not in theaters, but I'm guessing that Sam and I will eventually own the movie (because actually, I think we own all Pixar films save "Cars"), and I'm sure I'll watch it again some day. I can't imagine feeling less sad, to be honest.
I cried too. At the cockroach, a couple times. I almost screamed when Wall-E squished him, even though it was supposed to be funny. I cried at the comatose-Eve parts, too, and then again when he grabs hold of the spaceship and sees "real" space for the first time. And at the end, just because.
Did you notice how they made Eve's voice more little girly - impetuous but kind of flirtatious at the same time - as the movie progressed?
Posted by: Britt | July 23, 2008 at 09:27 PM