is Wall-E rubbish for the environment

A cute little robot left to clear up the earth after humankind has to evacutate when the rubbish piles up too high is causing an almightly eco-row in Hollywood according to the Observer (6th July 2008). The robot, Wall-E, looks set to be the must have toy for children this christmas in a film that should send out all the right messages - and that’s the problem. Well one of them. It seems that the film makers can’t win as whilst Pixar’s £90 million film champions green issues through the portrayal of an apocolyptical world rendered uninhabitable by mankinds’s rapacious materialism - it is being attacked on all sides. Right wing bloggers have criticised the film for being ‘leftist propoganda’ about the evils of mankind takig at dig at Hollywoods recent moves to join up to the green agenda. At the same time the massive merchandising hype surrounding the film has angered environmentalists. 300 robot themed items will hit the shops when the film is released in the UK in two weeks time - including a remote controlled Wall-E robot. And Wall-E (which stands for Waste Allocation Load Lifter Earth - Class E) who has a lonely life when the film starts as the last robot working (accompaned only by friendly a cockroach and a VHS of Hello Dolly) looks set to feature in a host of products including Wall-E sweets, greeting cards, puzzles, video games and shoes - which have been described as ‘kitch for our kids manufactured in China in environment destroying factories and packed in plastic that will take hundreds of years to biodegrade in our landfills’. Watch the film - don’t buy the merchandise - that is going to be a tough call for parents this year!