WALL-E is special for more than the story it tells. It’s also the culmination of a young man’s life, as it’s dedication to animator Justin Wright is so much more than a thank you to the man for his work. It’s a validation of the life he chose to live when he knew that life itself was so fragile. Justin Wright was born with a heart that had a long list of problems and was never destined to last all that long. By the time he was 12 his heart was as worn out as an old soccer ball and in just about as bad shape. A successful transplant managed to give him the heart of a 30-year old so that he could continue living and experience more throughout his life than he might have achieved had he not been given the chance. Thankfully that chance wasn’t wasted as Justin grew up to achieve his dream of working at Pixar, where he’d visited as a child of the Make-A-Wish foundation.
It should go without saying that life is precious, and that it’s to be enjoyed every day without hesitation. Of course we don’t always look at each breath and each waking moment as gift. We take for granted a lot of what we’re given and don’t say thank you enough for each day that passes before our eyes. Justin however managed to live every last moment seeking out his goal and finding ways to get past the dead ends that life put in his way, challenging himself continually until he finally got his wish, to become an animator at the studio that had brought him such joy as a child. Eventually he became one of those folks that works on storyboards and brings ideas to the heads of the studio about how the movie should go, and he did his absolute best to insure that the stories he brought were of the greatest importance.
Justin understood within the story of WALL-E how important it was to instill a sense of heart within the main character and show how that big heart could change everything if it was allowed to do so. If you’ve seen the movie then you know that WALL-E has to do with a very dark time in the future when humanity has been relegated to unthinking lumps of flesh that are guided by consumerism and greed, leaving the machines to do all the work for them. WALL-E, perhaps the last of his kind, has seen the desolation of a world and has witnessed the fading of a history in which too many people took too many things for granted. Despite being a robot he has more than enough heart to try and change things, to preserve what is still there, and to live every day as though it’s worth the effort.
Whether this was Justin’s contribution to the story or a combined effort of the writers and animators, it’s a poignant reminder that everything is fleeting, and that we have now is important enough to stop and pay attention now and again. Justin passed from a massive heart attack only three months before the movie was released. But no matter what, he lived his dream.
Follow Us
