Set in a future where the Earth has become covered in trash, swept by monstrous, rumbling dust storms and whose only bona fide wildlife is the cockroach (a literally running gag), "WALL·E" refers to our hero－a Waste Allocation Load Lifter, Earth class. The cute, mechanically chirping robot has been left behind to toil endlessly in the shadow of the planet's rubbish skyline, collecting garbage, compressing garbage, living his solitary life amid his amassed artifacts of bygone human society (a Rubik's cube, a flashbulb, a museum's worth of Zippo lighters).

It's embarrassing－is this what would be left of us? Meanwhile, a mass of humankind has been traveling through space for 700 years waiting for Earth to regenerate－and, thanks to the constant attention of robots, has been reduced (if that's the word) to morbid obesity, sloth and watching interactive video screens. This is not the Enchanted Forest. It's too plausible for that.

Not everything here is original－the title character is a direct lift, physically and vocally, from "E.T." It doesn't matter, however, because Eve, the Extraterrestrial Vegetation Evaluator who arrives to collect plant samples and steal WALL·E's heart is a beeping, humming anime heroine.