WALL-E

Guest Review By: Josh Walker on 4.10.2010

The Movie Itself:
If you are like me and hear that Disney and Pixar are teaming up for another animated hit, you almost expect it to be a big success. Wall-E definitely delivers for the titan animation team again. I was intrigued to see how the story of a robot would play out and it does so wonderfully. The story, plot and characters are absolutely brilliant. I am admittedly a fan of the animated genre as I have made it a goal to own almost all of them. This definitely ranks high on my list of favorites. If you are a fan of these types of films as well, you are in for an excellent treat in all aspects of this presentation. Just as Finding Nemo and Toy Story and others, Pixar produces a classic film once again.

Wall-E is a robot whose only function is to clean the Earth of garbage that has overrun the planet. Human kind has left on a cruise-like space ship until the mess has been cleaned and they prove that Earth can still sustain life, leaving Wall-E all alone. He spends each and every day in the lonely existence of a wasteland of trash and emptiness, packing and stacking trash. He finds solitude in collecting random objects and keeping them in his hub which he has transformed into his home.

He continues in this repetitive and mundane life until one day another robot is dropped off on Earth. This robot, later introduced as EVE, is on a mission to find life and is on a much stricter program than Wall-E. Although, Wall-E eventually confronts the robot EVE and is love struck. I was unaware robots could feel emotion, but it is a fun Pixar film so why not. EVE eventually finds a small plant and becomes a lifeless storage pod for it until the spaceship that dropped her off returns for the specimen. Wall-E stands by her side through it all, not giving up on his new found love.

The adventure continues on the space ship along with the humans which are flying around outer space until they prove Earth can once again sustain life. They have all become lazy and overweight as a result of being waited on hand and foot by the robots they created. Wall-E and EVE find themselves in a battle against the captain of the ships assistant robot in order to return the humans to Earth. It is truly a great tale filled with laughter and excitement throughout.
Rating: 8/10

The Presentation:
Wall-E is presented in a 1080p/AVC MPEG-4 encode with a 2.35:1 aspect ratio and is absolutely amazing. Colors are brilliant and pop off the screen. Some of the neon affects in the space ship feel as though they are 3D. It often reminded me of Speed Racer in that aspect. Of course with a computer generated animation film like this, you expect a great visual experience but this went above and beyond my personal expectations. Colors are exceptionally crisp and clean, blacks are dark and true. I would have to really stretch to make a complaint about the quality here. Overall, this boasts one of the most impressive visual animated releases on Blu-ray that I have seen.

Wall-E features a DTS-HD Lossless Master Audio track in 6.1 Surround (48kHz/24-bit) which is stunning as well. The artwork lists a 5.1 track, but in fact it is 6.1. There are many scenes in which the robots fly around coming from each angle and the surround presence really captures the panning greatly. Explosions really give the LFE channel a work out and shake the room in a few instances. The first part of the film has almost no dialogue, but the ambience of the environment is still in a 360 degree field from utilizing the surrounds so well. I had a hard time not awarding this presentation with a perfect 10 overall, but I felt the audio could have possibly been a bit stronger in some scenes.
Rating: 9/10

The Extras:
Note: This review is for the 2 disc edition which contains fewer extras than the 3 disc counterpart. Here are some highlights.

Audio Commentary – Your basic optional audio commentary available to play while watching the feature film. Short Film: "Burn-E" (HD, 7 minutes) – A short starring a character with a very small role in the film. It plays through the timeline of the movie while focusing on this one character attempting to repair a beacon light on the spaceship. It is a very funny Featurette. Short Film: “Presto” (HD, 5 minutes) – A humorous Pixar short starring a magician’s trick rabbit playing practical jokes on him during his act. It features some very creative writing using the magic hat as the main prop. Theatrical Trailers (HD) – A collection of numerous trailers for previous Disney releases and also a 'Disney Parks' advertisement. Deleted Scenes (HD, 23 minutes) – Basic deleted scene collection. Nothing really stood out to me. "Behind-the-Scenes" Featurettes A handful of behind the scenes shorts. BnL Shorts (HD, 9 minutes) – 3 short films. Pretty entertaining I must admit. Documentary: "The Pixar Story" (HD, 88 minutes) – A great documentary on the history of Pixar Studios Bot Files (HD) - Each robot in the film is shown and we are given a few facts about each one. Trailers (HD) – Four theatrical trailers for Wall-E 3-D Set Fly-Troughs (HD) – A tour of the sets created for the film. Axiom Arcade (HD) – Four arcade style games each with the Wall-E theme. Digital Copy- The second disc is your standard digital copy so you can enjoy the film anywhere on your portable devices.
Rating: 7/10

Overall:
Wall-E is an absolutely brilliant animated instant classic. You can’t help but love the characters and cheer for them. I found it strange at first since the characters didn’t really speak, but it worked out just fine. The presentation alone is a completely amazing and totally remarkable achievement in animation and a perfect opportunity to showcase the technology of Blu-ray. This is a definite must own Blu-ray disc for everyone in my opinion.
Rating: 8/10