Film is a favorite medium for those who want to send a message to the masses, and understandably so. With the right script and production, directors can enjoy the opportunity to create a universe that mirrors their worldview. Pro-life directors can represent women who obtain abortions as irresponsible, irreligious, or, perhaps, innocent victims of an industry that likes nothing so much as a chance to murder children. Gun control advocates can film criminals buying firearms on suburban street-corners and wide-eyed children stumbling across their parents’ handguns as though they were poorly-hidden Christmas presents.
Every film portrays a different reality, and good directors know this. Whether they decide to overtly portray some message or set of messages, hint at a message, or try their best to stay neutral, directors must be aware of how their end production presents itself.
Regardless of intent, though, most movies end up on the analysis couches of pundits, politicos, preachers, and the whole range of people who try to read the zeitgeist while seeking confirmation of their opinions.
This summer has been particularly ripe for the message-searching. It is, after all, an election year, which means that films with political messages have been a bit more common, and films without have been examined carefully nonetheless, often with triumphant proclamations of subversion found.
Wall-E and The Dark Knight have been the subject of particular scrutiny. Wall-E has been lauded for its environmental message and, hilariously, accused of promoting “liberal fascism.” The Dark Knight has been seen as a love letter to George W. Bush, somewhat understandably, as an endorsement of any-means necessary anti-terrorist action. What, exactly, are these films really trying to say?
I can’t tell you; I didn’t direct either of them. What I can do is throw out my interpretation of Wall-E. The Dark Knight could easily merit its own column, but, for now, I’d rather write about an endearing, animated robot. I should warn you that I’m going to discuss some late-movie plot points, although I’ll try to keep my terms general.
I don’t think anyone can deny that Wall-E is firmly rooted in the “we are Earth’s stewards” school of thought. Wall- E’s future is one in which rampant consumption and reckless production have turned Earth into a wasteland in divers shades of brown and grey. What’s left of humanity has been floating in a luxury hotel of a starship around some sort of nebula for seven hundred years, while robots compact and stack cubes of trash into massive piles until only one, who has acquired a sort of sentience, remains functional. It’s a grim vision of an unsustainable economy, for sure, but what of the other “messages?”
The two biggest complaints that I’m aware of (and can make sense of) are that
a) Wall-E mocks its audience by portraying them as fat, immobile, media-thralls and b) humans in Wall-E are all Americans, and this is a problem.
Part of the fiction of the film covers why humanity has rounded off. The explanation given is that centuries of Low-G life have caused a loss of bone mass, which has made humans tremendously obese. Whether or not that’s scientifically on point doesn’t matter - there have been sillier explanations in sci-fi. What does matter is what follows from the circumstances
that humanity has found itself in Wall-E. Too obese to freely move around, humans are taken through their days by hoverchairs, given all the while a constant stream of media and conversation.
Is this a mockery of modern affluent humanity? I tend to think not. Seven hundred years aboard a sterile starship allows certain trends to fall into place. Boredom with the static environment undoubtedly led to greater reliance in media from the very start, and seven hundred years of growing girth has dealt the final blow to mobility. What’s easily more important than pseudo-sci-fi apologia is the portraya lof the human personality. As Wall-E arrives and kicks a few humans out of their rut, we see that they immediately take to the world around them. They rediscover the beauty of space. They realize the value of face-to-face interaction. They find genuine joy in life.
In fact, the only villains in the story are the robots that can’t escape the rut. Every human in the movie, when taken out of their comfortable path, rises to the occasion. This is an incredibly optimistic view of mankind.
As for the Americanness of humanity? An in-film explanation could easily be that seven hundred years with a small population will tend to homogenize accents, although it should also more or less eliminate visible racial distinctions. All in all, I suspect that the voices and exactingly proportional multiracial nature of the passengers was merely a result of Pixar’s way of doing business. I suspect that the studio thought nothing of it.
So, what is Wall-E’s message? I believe that this is it: Humanity must be able to adapt to a changing world, and we must keep that world alive for ourselves and future generations. Our only enemy is the inability to adapt. Also, love will find a way, even if it has to tow a comatose body around before following it into space.