Academic

Saturday night, we took 9 children to see Wall-E as part of the "tweener" birthday sleepover at our house.  All nine really enjoyed it, and the two adults liked it as well.  (In fact, two of our guests had seen it the day before, but wanted to see it again.)  The movie is a mixture of 1984, 2001: A Space Odyssey, and Noah's Ark.  If I got all the clues correctly, at some point in the next century, Earth becomes fairly unlivable.  The movie doesn't quite explain why or how, but it has something to do with very large amounts of trash everywhere.  Perhaps because of the trash and possible other errors of environmental degradation, the Earth has become toxic.  What seems to be a Wal-Mart on steriods, "B-n-L" (Big -N-Large), hosts five-year space cruises so that Earthlings can go cruise around the galaxy while the company cleans up Earth, supposedly using robots like Wall-E to do the job.  For reasons that aren't clear, clean-up was abandoned, and the cruise ship has been stationary in outer space for 700 years, and our hero, Wall-E, has been alone, cleaning up Earth for the same time.

So, yeah, there's a lot of message here.  And lest you think it was all about the environment and our disposal society that buys more plastic crap than it knows what to do with, the Earthlings on the cruise ship are so fat now that they glide around the ship in a reclining position on their hover chairs, having forgotten how to walk.  We are told that this may be because of bone loss due to being 20 or so generations in space, but there's also clues that it's because of constant calorie intake through big SuperGulp cups and no physical activity.

The actual plot is much simpler:  Wall-E and his newfound friend Eve (no message there), a probe from the cruise ship, must convince the Captain that Earth can sustain life now and that the ship should return.  There are some plot disconnects, but let's suspend our disbelief:  Where are the rest of the earthlings, surely 7 billion people couldn't fit on one cruise ship?  How are there babies on the cruise ship when the passengers literally cannot get up or turn over when they fall off their hover chairs?  Where does the cruise ship's "regenerating food buffet" get its food without photosynthesis?  How has Wall-E retained power for himself and his makeshift home for 700 years -- super batteries?

So, the big question is whether kids can relate to this environmental horror film?  I think the answer is yes.  For those of you without elementary school kids, "Reduce, Reuse, Recycle" has replaced the "Just Say No" slogan of the 1990s.  (I guess the mantra of my elementary generation was "Free to Be. . . You and Me.")  Kids are fairly well indoctrinated with the concept of recycling, if not clearly the reasons behind it.  I asked my six-year-old what he thought caused Earth to become unlivable in the movie, and his first reaction was "Litter."  Then he said, "Reduce, Reuse, Recycle."