Case Study 3 (Due: January 6, 2011)

• Make a comprehensive reaction paper for the two movies in no less than 300 words each.
  
• Make a comparative analysis of the two movies you chosen.
  

The two movies that i have chosen to make a reaction paper and a comparative analysis are the surrogates and Wall-E since they were the only movies i remember the movies was all about. Actually, i already watched some of these movies before but then i wasn't able to remember the plot. That's why i have chosen these two movies is because they were the latest ones and luckily Wall-E is one of my favorite movies.

The first movie i have to make a reaction paper is the Wall-E which happens to be one of my favorite movies. Starring a box shaped little robot with more than a passing resemblance to E.T., WALL-E is quite possibly the cutest Pixar hero ever, despite the fact that he's a trash compactor with eyes. A story centering on a wordless robot could be cold and uninviting, but not in Pixar's capable hands. Never has a robot been this compassionate: WALL-E's got heart.The story of the film is deceptively simple. WALL-E (Waste Allocator Load Lifter - Earth Class) is the last of his kind, a robot created by the Buy-N-Large Corporation to clean up the piles of trash left on Earth by the conspicuous consumption of human beings. The humans themselves have evacuated the now-toxically trashed Earth for a Eden-like spaceship habitat called the Axiom (also created by BNL corp.), where they spend their days sipping meals out a cup and reclining on floating easy chairs. Things change drastically for WALL-E the day EVE shows up. She is slick and futuristic and quite obviously a girl; WALL-E falls in love almost immediately. It turns out EVE has been sent from the Axiom to scan the earth for signs of habitable life. Their convincing courtship is done completely without dialogue, quite a feat for sound designer Ben Burtt who found a way to make ambient noise into recognizable words for WALL-E. Trying to impress the coolly modern EVE, WALL-E shows her the seedling he found, at which point EVE goes into a hibernation state and awaits the return of her spaceship. WALL-E, of course, cannot abide by his beloved EVE's status and hitches a ride into space to save her. Though he is tiny and relegated to the dirtiest of the dirty jobs, WALL-E truly understands how to find value in sullied things and how to create magic out of useless objects. He is more human than the humans inthat way and slowly, without preaching (he can't even talk), WALL-E begins to show them how to regain what they have lost through sloth and over reliance on technology. [1]

The second movie is the Surrogates which was directed by Jonathan Mostow and the leading actor was played by Bruce Willis. Set in present day, people have found a new way to live their lives to the fullest — with surrogate robots. The robots are a sexy, physically perfect mechanical representations of themselves. Basically you’re you, only hotter and better at everything that you do. With everyone safe in their homes, free of pain, fear and consequences, the world is a utopia, that is until the first murder occurs and FBI agent Greer (Willis) will have to leave his surrogate behind and risk his life to unravel the mystery. In the not-so-distant future, technology has advanced to the point that humans use mind-controlled robots to go about their daily lives, letting the robots-- or surrogates-- experience the world while we relax at home in tricked-out Barcaloungers. Bruce Willis plays Greer, an FBI investigator who is at first living life like everyone else through his surrogate, who is Bruce Willis wearing a half-ton of pancake makeup and a ludicrous blond wig.

There are a lot of interesting ideas in Surrogates, from the intentionally wooden acting by some surrogates to the Wall-E-esque degradation of the human bodies behind the machines, but Mostow is far too absorbed in the nonsense conspiracy plot and frenetic action sequences to allow the audience to explore the world he's created. Half-baked and generic, Surrogates is entertaining enough for what it is, but a bland take on what could have been truly special. [2]

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REFERENCES:
[1] http://www.cinemablend.com/dvds/WALL-E-3211.html
[2] http://www.cinemablend.com/dvds/Surrogates-4198.html

The Live Free or Die Hard is one of the most spectacular movies I've seen. While spicing up with attention capturing details of each action, this movie leaves some excitements that I can’t help to be desired. I enjoyed watching this movie and surprise on what technology can do –mess in our country. It is one of the amazing movies I watched. No doubt that director Len Wiseman did a great job directing this film.
The main character in this movie was a NYPD detective John McClane (Bruce Willis), a toughest and heroic cop on the force with his nerdy sidekick Matt Farrell (Justin Long) who doesn’t know that he was chased by this group of cyber- villains who utilize codes and algorithms to get into key Federal government installations, including the Federal Bureau of Investigation. They’re operating under a man named Thomas Gabriel (Timothy Olyphant), who has used enough computer nerds in his operation that none of the computer hackers know who they are working for or what they are truly doing. As what I’ve understand, Thomas Gabriel lead this foolishness things to earn money. That’s it! They try to manipulate all. The traffic lights, the passages, the networks, everything that is computer involved! As I watched the movie, I realized how this technologies influence us and sometimes we are not aware that we are already reliant to this things. What if those hacking thing will happen to our country? Surely it’s a very big mess! I do hope we also have as heroic as John McClane and as genius as Matt Farell. Lol!
Anyway, the movie was full of actions and groundbreaking drama. It is realistic in a sense that “hacking” thing exists. But for me, “hacking” is not really bad. It depends on how you employ it. This innovation is best only when it helps us to ease our works not to harm people.

WALL-E
A computer-animated science fiction film produced by Pixar Animation Studios and directed by Andrew Stanton. The story is about the box-liked robot named WALL-E (Waste Allocation Load Lifter Earth Class) who has been left on earth to clean up the mess of the uninhabitable abandoned planet called “Earth”. He met this cold and suspicious hostile robot EVE who was deployed to search for signs of life on earth and fell in love. As he shows to EVE the plant that he discover in collecting the trash, EVE automatically send signal from nowhere and goes standby. WALL-E was so worried because a spaceship came and gets EVE. He anxiously tries to save EVE and clings to its hull. In the spaceship, WALL-E found out there is human passenger’s who suffer from severe bone loss and obese by relying on the ship’s automated system in many years. The plant made the captain dream and realizes that they must return to restore their home. There were some actions brought by WALL-E and his gang (malfunctioning robots) just to save the plant. The captain opens the holo-detector while fighting the villain AUTO, a robotic autopilot who doesn’t want to return to earth and rebels and trying to close the holo-detector. Unfortunately, WALL-E was crush as he holds open the holo-detector for the sake that plant will be place to it. EVE realized that she must brings WALL-E's body back to his home where she can find the parts of WALL-E and repairs and reactivates him. Unfortunately, WALL-E's memory is erased and he reverts to his original trash compactor programming. Heartbroken, EVE gives WALL-E a farewell "kiss" which causes an electric spark that reboots WALL-E's memory and restores him to his usual self. WALL-E and EVE happily reunite and join the humans and robots in restoring Earth's environment. Yehey!
All I can say is that WALL-E is a nice touching film. I loved this film so much I admit that I shed a few tears during it. This movie is a combination of a computer-animated science fiction and a love story that is done completely without dialogue.

LIVE FREE OR DIE HARD AND WALL-E
The both movies included a theme technology. In the movie Die Hard4, it is realistic in a sense that hacking really exists while the movie WALL-E, it is futuristic in a sense that it shows what will be the face of our planet trough these years. I want to share this quote of Stanton that describe theme of the film WALL-E:

In this case study, we are tasked to watch at least two movies and give some insights about it.

The two movies that I choose to watch are: I,Robot and Wall-E.


WALL-E (2008)

Approximately seven hundred years in the future, the earth is over-run with garbage and devoid of plant and animal life; the consequence of years of environmental degradation and thoughtless consumerism. Humans are now living on the spaceship Axiom after vacating Earth centuries earlier. The original plan was for humans to live in outer space temporarily while cleaning robots prepared Earth for recolonization. However, after seven hundred years, only one cleaning robot remains:WALL-E.

In this 3D animated movie, you cannot identify or should I say hard to tell whether it is real or not. It really looks real. Especially the settings on earth and the looks of the robot. The movie or the author wanted to emphasized what the people wanted to have and epitomizes the desires for a better world or better future. In this movie also highlighted that the robots are created to make our life easier but not to the extent that all people becomes lazy and life will be dependent to robots.


I, Robot (2004)

Set in a future Earth (2035 A.D.) where robots are common assistants and workers for their human owners, this is the story of "robotophobic" Chicago Police Detective Del Spooner's investigation into the murder of Dr. Alfred Lanning, who works at U.S. Robotics, in which a robot, Sonny , appears to be implicated, even though that would mean the robot had violated the Three Laws of Robotics, which is apparently impossible. It seems impossible because.. if robots can break those laws, there's nothing to stop them from taking over the world, as humans have grown to become completely dependent upon their robots. Or maybe... they already have? Aiding Spooner in his investigation is a psychologist, Dr. Susan Calvin, who specializes in the psyches of robots.

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The point of view of this movie is that,you cannot control all the robots and can be your slaves forever. There's also a time that the robots would change and can identify what is wrong and right thing to do.


Both Wall-e and I,Robot are movies that shows us the idealistic view of the future. I was amazed in the creation and effects of both movies . However, in my own insights, the "I, Robot" has the more realistic effects compare to the effects of the Wall-E movie. I find I,Robot movie more realistic because of the interaction made by humans and robots as if they were real.