"Wall-E" produced by Pixar Studios follows the tradition of Pixar: lively and lovely characters, accompanied by relaxed and ridiculous dialogues, small plots, small burdens and small emotions, and it is suitable for all ages. The story begins hundreds of years later when humans on Earth have moved to outer space. The protagonist Wali is the only robot left, and his profession is a humble garbage worker. One after another, the garbage buildings built by Walli are taller than the tallest skyscraper ever built by mankind. This guy is curious and lively. He likes to collect strange gadgets from the trash the most. He has the humorous temperament and tenacious spirit of the optimistic little character. Wali’s life was fulfilling, but very lonely, with only the cockroach "Xiaoqiang" as his company, until one day an alien spaceship suddenly fell from the sky. The clean, beautiful and advanced robot Eve came to the earth to search for plants, the "earth kid" met the "alien princess", and Wali's space adventure began.
Compared with other similar animation works, such as "Kung Fu Panda" released earlier, I think "Wall-E" has some very different characteristics that make it surpass the Hollywood animation works of the same period, which is worth remembering.
The first is the design of the character image. Pixar’s creative staff is really amazing in the anthropomorphic design of Wali. For example, when Wali goes home from work, he unloads the track that wraps his feet and hangs it on the shelf like a person takes off his shoes; when he wakes up early in the morning, the power is insufficient. This guy will also stumble and stumble out until the solar battery is fully charged, just like every office worker who can't sleep without coffee. Eve's shape is like an egg, smooth and fluent, with no complicated expressions except that the eyes can express a smile. This brought challenges to the emotional communication between her and Wali, but it also served the focus of the film very well-Eve's introvertedness contrasted with Wali's enthusiasm, which is one of the necessary conditions for the development of the plot.
In addition to the two main robot images of Walli and Eve, the design of other auxiliary characters in the film is also remarkable. The cleaner robot on the spacecraft is simply a paranoid aunt with obsessive-compulsive disorder, and the group of malfunctioning robots are simple and funny, and small pranks can often help a lot. As for the evolution of our humanity after 800 years, every veteran webworm will probably smile, and at the same time will be secretly surprised.
Echoing the image design is the dialogue arrangement in the film. The two robots, Wali and Eve, are probably hundreds of years apart in technological level and age, but there is no difference in their conversations—the only thing they often say is to call each other’s names; even if the plot is a little more complicated, There are no more than three or four words to increase-all emotions and emotions have to be expressed through these extremely limited vocabulary and corresponding tone, which undoubtedly makes the importance of silent body language greatly surpassed the voice dialogue and becomes even more important. Media means. Relatively speaking, Wali’s body language in the film is richer and anthropomorphic. Although it is an old and broken low-level robot, it is agile and agile. The expression, movement and tone of the three organically combine to complement each other; Eve’s egg shape is limited. In addition to the use of body language, once the body movements appear, they are often subtle and prominent, and are closely related to the development of the plot, which is impressive.
In addition to the unique image design and excellent body language arrangement, the potential background of "Wall-E" is also more forward-looking than the general cartoons that are solely for the children's market. Today, when oil prices are rising day by day and the greenhouse effect is unstoppable, it is estimated that the main publicity of the major premise of environmental protection is not just children; and the second half of the film uses the famous film music clip of "2001 Space Journey" with "Captain One The small step, the big step for mankind, is a clear and unmistakable tribute to Kubrick, one of the masters of the science fiction movie "Double Rose". Children watching this clip may only get nervous with the ups and downs of the plot, but for a senior movie fan who loves Kubrick or science fiction, the meaning of such "subtext" may go far beyond the movie itself, even It may be bloody and inexplicable.
Fortunately, this kind of ambition is neither too weak to confuse discerning people, nor is it too artificial and deviates from the commercial positioning of the film itself to become a pedantic and incompatible with the cartoon itself. Being able to find the right position between the children's animation market and the positioning of adult films can properly grasp the balance. I think this is the source of the special temperament of "Wall-E". Based on this alone, probably Pixar Studios can borrow "Wall-E" to win another Oscar nomination for Best Animated Feature.
Of course, "Wall-E" is a cartoon produced by Disney after all, and the ending is still inevitably clichéd. However, because the ups and downs are too obvious, the intention of the reunion ending is obvious. Although it is regrettable in terms of the smoothness of the plot, I think adult audiences can actually regard it as an open ending, and those who are interested can even see it as an open ending. Compared with "Artificial Intelligence", look for a deeper and more serious movie-watching experience.
Published in the July 2008 issue of "Movie World"
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