I realize the big box office news this weekend is focused on “The Dark Knight” (yet again) but the intriguing statistic to me is this: “WALL-E” has passed the $200 million mark in the U.S.
“WALL-E” is the Bright Knight.
Sure, it’s a Pixar picture and Pixar always makes hits, but “WALL-E” surprised me for several reasons:
It’s a message movie. It has an absurd title. Compared with the big animated hits of the past, “WALL-E” is neither that funny nor that entertaining. There’s no real heavy and hence no jeopardy.
You would think the kids would text-message each other that “WALL-E” is too preachy and that it’s even a bit of a downer. All those fat people stuck on a space ship. That’s no fun.
The success of “WALL-E” in fact reminds me of the theory about animation enunciated by Matt Groening, who created a little show called “The Simpsons.”
“Good animation is written for adults, not for children,” Groening stated in the summer issue of Written By, the magazine of the Writers Guild. “The secret of our success is that the show was written for a smart audience.”
Groening first sketched out the Simpson family in five minutes while waiting to pitch a show called “Life in Hell.” His scribbles, of course, turned out to be a billion dollar idea which ensured that Groening would never have even a fleeting visitation in development hell.
“WALL-E” won’t hit a billion, but it will beat the amazing success of Pixar’s “Ratatouille” in the U.S. and already is approaching $75 million in a slow rollout overseas. That’s a pretty good achievement for a movie that basically seems to break all the rules (except for Matt Groening’s).
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