a blog to trace the pathway of students in his/iar552 at the university of north carolina at greensboro

Wednesday, April 14, 2010

Wall E

This movie reminded me chiefly of Dorfman and Mattelart's "Instructions on How to become a General in the Disneyland Club."

The authors propose that "Adult values are projected onto the child, as if childhood was a special domaine where these values could be protected uncritically (p.126, Media and Culture Studies)." The movie was highly critical of issues that adults are discussing in the first decade of the 21st century and as we begin the second. Rising lethargic and obese people, reliance on machines to do everything from toast bread to move around in space without human interaction with planets, and environmental declination. In the film, the mechanized convenience is illustrated through the advertisement at the beginning of the film, in the people moving only thanks to a flying lounge, and even having gotten down to consuming liquified foods (which was gross, btw).

However, are these really issues that a child would think about without their interactions with adults? I would say no. There seems to be plenty of centuries where children do not seem to have been concerned with obesity, mechanized convenience (at least before the introduction in the 19th century of machines in households, generally still requiring intense human interaction), or the future health of the planet long after they have become adults or even after their deaths.

Disney also conveys this adult concern of romantic love. Children want to be loved (according to numerous observations by family and strangers and psychologists) but every Disney movie involves a intimate, romantic love and passion which can always overcome anything. That is to my mind not a "child fantasy" (language coming from the article) but an adult fantasy. It simply just does not hold up to reality that passionate, romantic love will conquer evil or that it will survive forever in a timeless tale. While Wall-E has strong presentist values (which I'm in agreement with but I am an adult), the timeless tale of this love comes from other fairy tales which Disney has succeeded in creating a multibillion dollar empire (Sleeping Beauty, Cinderella, etc.).

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