WALL-E and Pixar

Toy Story, Bug's Life, Monster's Inc., Toy Story 2, Finding Nemo, Cars, The Incredibles, Ratatouille and now WALL-E. The folks at Pixar have figured something out. They have managed to recapture an audience that was starving for the simplicity and humanity found in the cartoons of 40 years ago. Cartoons had devolved into flashing whizbang, bubblegum storylines, and whining characters all aimed at selling cereal and figurines. Not that you can't buy a Mike and Sully doll at Disney World, but the story is first. Pixar has succeeded in mirroring the Warner Brother and Hanna-Barbara toons that had something for children and adults. There were always two (or three) levels one could watch Wile E. Coyote on -- sly jokes that no six year old could get. Pixar became the modern home of this wit and added technical know-how to
slicken the deal for those who are accustomed a polished product.
With WALL-E, Pixar returns to its roots by animating a mechanical, inanimate object. (Their first output was a short called Luxo, Jr., which featured a rambunctious swivel lamp.)
WALL-E is the last of a group of robots left on an abandoned earth. Hi job is to consolidate the massive heaps of trash into cubes and stacked into skyscrapers of junk. There's just one thing -- this robot has developed a personality, and he's lonely in the vastness of space. Then another robot (Eve) lands and his life changes.
It is amazing how many subtleties are entirely understandable from a little box and few squawks and chirrups. WALL-E proves to be a nice a being as there could be. He is incredibly sweet to others, generous, curious and heartfelt. He is not perfect and sometimes his remarkable sincerity gets him into trouble. But it is these pitfalls of the naive that make him all the more sympathetic. And lovable.
WALL-E manages to steer away from overt sentimentality, for the most part, and focus on the characters. The only slight weak point of the film is a somewhat overly simple plot. After WALL-E boards the Axiom spaceship in search of his love, Eve, and we learn that Earth has been abandoned there is a lag in the storytelling. The good guys run from the bad guys, then get caught, then escape and try again -- one too many times. There were a few minutes where plot movement seemed suspended before it picked up again for the adventurous ending.
They did a fine job, however, balancing the clear environmental message / warning with humor and innocence.
Pixar has also resurrected the tradition of showing animated shorts before their features. The one accompanying WALL-E, "Presto" is their best since "Birds on A Wire." It's frantic, energetic and very funny.

The Power of Audrey Hepburn and "Sabrina" (1954)

I haven't made it to the theatres for a couple of weeks so I decided to review a classic - one that I found deserved revisiting.
It's true that every time we show an Audrey Hepburn film at the theatre, we get at least 100 more people to show up. It's such a drastic increase that we have considered (and only half-jokingly) making it the Audrey Hepburn Film Society instead. As it is, we are determined to include at least one of her films in each series. Not that I mind. As a girl who spent her teen years awkwardly skinny and aloof, I clung to people like her. Billy Wilder himself said, "Audrey Hepburn will single-handedly make bosoms a thing of the past." She gave us gangly things hope - an ounce to possibility that someone would find us gamine and irresistible too. All was not lost.
Though I enjoyed Sabrina (1954), it was never my favorite of her films. I detest Humphrey Bogart's acting. I think he is dry, completely non-captivating, and not enjoyable to look at or watch. His voice is grating and you have to translate his horrible speech patterns. So it was always difficult for me to understand how he got the girl, especially Hepburn. I understand they needed someone less dashing than William Holden, but I still find Bogart an irritant to watch.
I think this dynamic was my main problem with Sabrina. I loved her "ugly duckling" transformation and her dress when she enters the party is stunning (I still want to find one like it to get married in someday). John Williams, (not the composer) who plays her father, and the rest of the staff are very funny but I still didn't rank it as high as other classic films.
Then we booked it for our summer film series, and as predicted, it was the best selling film of the series so far. I didn't get to watch all of it but slipped in for a few minutes and Hepburn's magic was unmistakable. She made the film breathe. Suddenly, Bogart wasn't as annoying. Watching her, 25 feet tall, in a room with more than 300 others just as captivated, made me realize the true power of stardom. And she had it. Yes, she was beautiful, but it a way, she was a bit funny looking. Unusual. No one watched, or watches her, for her beauty. It's for something else. Something much more ethereal. It's because she's not curvaceous that we like her. We want to see her because she's kinda funny, a little self-conscious, and a bit naive.
Cary Grant said, "All I want for Christmas is another movie with Audrey Hepburn."
Me too.