Wall E

[poliphilo]

Wall E looks a lot like Johnny 5 from Batteries Not Included who was- in his turn - a robotic rip-off Spielberg's E.T. As a character he's basically Charlie Chaplin with the grit taken out. I liked the first half hour- which made me think of City Lights- sad little person woos lady who is obviously out of his league- but once we get into space we're into one of those endless, slapstick chase sequences that all Pixar movies seem to have to have, followed by the death and resurrection scene that every fantasy movie since E.T. has had to have. Wall E looks great, but what passes for imagination is really the deft and inventive juggling of pre-existing tropes. I have seen it called "dystopian" but it's too sentimental for that- and the moral- consume less and go to the gym- is straight out of the analects of Mickey Mouse.