WALL-E (Three-Disc Special Edition)
December 2008 Reviewed by: Rad Bennett Format: Blu-ray	(all ratings out of 5): Overall Enjoyment Picture Quality Packaged Extras Sound Quality

WALL-E is a rare happening: an absolutely perfect film in each and every respect. It seems a cinch to win an Academy Award as best animated film when the Oscars are given out in a few months, but to my mind it should also be nominated as best picture. And it should win. It is G-rated, but it can’t be dismissed as a "kid’s film" because it explores some weighty topics. For the same reason, it can’t be dismissed as a lightweight romance about intergenerational robot love. It is a film that can be appreciated and enjoyed on many different levels, and a true family film that all can share. There’s not a wasted second in it, and calling it an animated film is quite in order. And that animation breaks new ground in the use of light and atmosphere, having been programmed to look like an anamorphic movie.

As the movie starts, we discover WALL-E and a cockroach friend as the last living things on a burned-out Earth. All the humans are out in space cruising around the universe and being waited upon by robots. WALL-E, a somewhat old-fashioned robot, slavishly pursues his programmed purpose: to compact waste and pack it into cubes which are then stacked as high as buildings. But WALL-E shows human tendencies. He has a special place, sort of a museum, where he brings discarded items that are of great interest to him. He has a VCR and a tape of Hello Dolly that he plays often, imitating the song and dance motions of the production numbers and sighing wistfully at the love scenes.

One day a rocket ship arrives and deposits Eve, a modern reconnaissance robot who floats effortlessly above the earth and can inflict destruction with her laser weapons. It’s love at first sight, and some of the most endearing scenes are those of WALL-E as an awkward suitor, bumbling yet sincere. Eve is taken back on the spaceship, WALL-E follows, and the two fall in love, helping to save the earth and mankind.

All of the characters are loveable in this movie; even the villain is merely misguided by slavishly adhering to a directive that no longer applies. WALL-E and Eve are made to seem very human by the adroit use of tiny motions and expressions as well as ingenious voice sound effects. The first half-hour is achieved without dialogue, yet its message is entirely clear and understandable.

Pixar has been boasting about this Blu-ray release for some time, saying it is closer than close to the original. They have good reason to say that. This is one of the best Blu-rays so far, just a smidgen short of Baraka but worthy to be mentioned in the same company. Colors and color schemes are absolutely right, contrast is perfect, and definition is first-rate. The DTS sound (mislabeled on the box as 5.1) is just as first-rate as the picture. The surrounds are in use the whole time. When they are not reproducing specific sounds they convey environmental ones.

There’s a fine commentary on disc 1, which can be simply heard, or, if you have a 1.1 player, experienced as picture-in-picture "Cine-Explore." There’s also another geek commentary, featuring tech people from the production. There are also two shorts on disc 1. The first is "Presto," a very amusing battle between a magician and his rabbit; the second is "BURN-E," an expanded story of the little robot who we encounter as WALL-E and Eve are ending their romance-in-space encounter. Disc 2 has many extras that are divided into two basic divisions: "Robots" and "Humans." The latter has the best extras. There’s a fascinating featurette on sound effects, which not only shows how they were achieved for WALL-E but how they were made in past Disney productions. I had no idea that the inventions made by previous sound crews were saved and preserved. Even better than that is a lengthy production feature on Pixar directed by Leslie Iwerks.

And, of course, with Disney there’s more: the usual still-frame galleries, a whole section of games, a gallery of the robots seen in the movie, a 3-D flyby tour of certain sections of the spaceship, and a group of theatrical trailers for other Disney films showing on the big screen and coming to Blu-ray. The third disc of this set allows you to burn a digital copy of the movie to your computer. There’s also a two-disc Blu-ray version of WALL-E, which omits that copy, and there are several configurations for DVD as well.

WALL-E is a perfect movie -- entertainment one can view many times over -- and the same must be said of the Blu-ray edition, which is state of the art at this point in the development of the medium.

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