Eco-Tainment #2: WALL-E

Pixar is perhaps the closest American equivalent of Hiyao Miyazaki's works. There are some obvious differences--for example, Pixar's movies are computer-animated rather than hand drawn, and none have a rating higher than PG--but both studios share their devotion to the artistic, story-driven side of animation. And, as it happens, both have produced films with nuanced, well-thought-out environmental morals.
In WALL-E, a polluted and lifeless Earth has been abandoned by humanity.Among the various relics of civilization that the title character, a solitary garbage-collecting robot, discovers is an old shoe with a plant growing in it--possibly the only one left in the world. This attracts the attention of EVE, a robotic sampling spacecraft sent to determine if Earth has become habitable for humans again. WALL-E is thus brought aboard the gigantic starship Axiom, which contains the remaining population of humans.
Aboard the Axiom, humans have grown obese from centuries of being pampered by the ship's robot crew. They have forgotten that Earth exists, and have no interest in returning. When the Axiom's intelligent autopilot (shades of HAL from 2001: A Space Odyssey) learns about the plant, he refuses to have the ship returned to Earth, and it is up to WALL-E and EVE to stop him.
The environmental messages in WALL-E are underlying rather than stated outright--indeed, the director of the film has stated that is was not even his original intent to write an environmental story, but he was surprised that so many people read an environmental message into it anyway. That said, it is hard to watch the captain of the Axiom marvel at the bygone wonders of Earth and not think that the writers had these themes in mind.
The Earth in WALL-E is in a dreadfully poor state. Besides the plant that kicks off the film's plot, the only living organism we see on Earth is a single cockroach, which WALL-E befriends early on in the movie. The implication, of course, is that all other animals and plants have died from humanity's mistreatment of the world.
Intentional or not, WALL-E is a welcome addition to the environmental film genre. Its animation is breathtaking, and the message is applied in such a way that it carries the story rather than overwhelming it--which is more than I can say for my next entry. . .

The title protagonist of WALL-E, a film that manages to convey its environmental message without being heavy-handed or overly proselytizing.