For me the beauty and the wonder of the movie Wall-e comes from the way in which it is able to instill the fundamentals of life and fellow-feeling in what seems to the human observer to be an inanimate object. While it is CGI, I had the feeling when first watching it that I was observing puppets in motion.
Puppetry as an art is both ancient, and, like many ancient things, deeply under-appreciated. It, and its sibling claymation, has been steadily fazed out because of improvements in computer graphics that see the material construction of cast/scenes to be an unnecessary and complicated expense.
But there is something to be said of the joy of animism in making the inanimate animate through these forms. That a puppeteer could pick up something seemingly dead and with a few skillful motions give it life and personality seems to me to have a powerful effect upon the imagination. It led my mind to reconsider the supposedly harsh duality between matter and mind, spirit and substance, and almost seems to lend a soul to the artifacts around us.
A greater appreciation of the personality of things would do much to ameliorate the present culture of waste and refuse that refuses to adhere to environmental responsibilities. Yet when it comes time for me to throw away some old jacket, or sell some long possessed relic of my childhood, I am often struck with the feeling that I am leaving behind a companion rather than a belonging.
No doubt this view is the height of eccentricity, but such foolishness may well save us in time.
For More Information:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shadow_play
http://www.mermaidtheatre.ns.ca/ (An excellent puppetry theater currently on tour across America)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Dark_Crystal
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