Wall-E

"Wall-E" is an amazing achievement in animated film making and is certain to be one of the best movies of the year. While I specified "animated film making", this is such a visual spectacle that you forget that what you're seeing is actually computer-generated. Even more impressive, the movie holds your attention even when there is no dialog for the first 40 minutes. With all of their successes, "Wall-E" is Pixar's most impressive creation yet.

The story follows Wall-E, a robot trash compactor left behind on Earth to clean up the mess that humans have made of the planet. Yes, there is a clear moral to this story, but it goes further than that. Not only is Earth trashed, but humans have been living on a giant spaceship for 700 years now where they have become fat, floating around on recliners where they are so tuned into their video screens that they aren't aware of the environment around them.

Occasionally the humans send probes to Earth to see if the planet is inhabitable, seeking signs of life. Wall-E, whose hobby is collecting human oddities such as bobble heads and rubber ducks and who is addicted to the 1969 musical "Hello, Dolly!", encounters one of these probes named EVE. Wall-E quickly falls in love and does his best to get EVE to do the same. If anything, "Wall-E" is a love story. Just as EVE warms up to our hero, she discovers life on Earth and is sent hurtling back to the spaceship. Wall-E follows his only love, and then the story really kicks in.

All of that happens in the first half of the movie, where there is no dialog, but sounds and images that mesmerize. Once aboard the ship the comedy continues between robots and humans, all while Wall-E tries to rescue EVE. Stay through the credits as they serve as a storyboard for what happens after our story ends.

I judge the quality of an animated movie by how both the adults and kids react. Here, not only did the adults and kids laugh and applaud, but even the smallest kids attention spans never lapsed. "Wall-E" is as good as all the reviews are saying. This will be only the twelfth movie in 7 years to get an A+ from me. Enjoy!

"Wall-E" is rated G with a running time of 97 minutes.