Wall.e

I’ve been mulling over our family trip to see the new Disney/Pixar movie Wall.e

Once the children got into the fact that the first third of the movie has almost no dialogue they really enjoyed it. There is a certain irony in watching a computer animated film that warns of the dangers in living a virtual life and there is a bigger irony that Wall.e, who spends his life clearing up rubbish, was then transformed into a give away from a certain well know fast food chain. Guess where most of those toys will already be!

I could also wax lyrical about the robot that is sent to see if earth can sustain life is called Eva – lots of links to both the Biblical story of creation and to the doves sent out from the ark to see if the flood was reducing – but you can make your own links there.

What also strikes me in my post-greenbelt buzz is that the movie celebrates human creativity. The captain of the spaceship discovers the wonder of dance, of planting seeds, of community. Maybe that is why Greenbelt works for so many people? Because it provides a moments when they are not dominated by screens and business and they have opportunity to reconnect with what really makes us human, creativity, community and faith.

Despite its commercial, corporate parentage Wall.e asks some big questions about values. What is important, can we keep living the way we live, what really matters, is life to be escaped or lived? I love Greenbelt because it doesn’t make money by asking those questions, but connects people who are attempting to work out honestly in their daily lives how we answer those questions as people of faith in a world that does often feel its coming apart.