This article mentions a reference to Titanic in WALL-E but doesn’t say what that reference was. I missed it when I was watching the movie. Can anyone point it out to me?
Uh, this is off the top of my head, but it might be when [spoil]the Axiom tips over and all the fat humans slide to one side.[/spoil] At least, that part reminded me of Titanic.
Thanks lizardgirl. That’s probably what the author of the article was talking about. Though I think maybe he was wrong (Pixar wasn’t trying to make a nod to Titanic when they wrote that scene).
woah i didnt even realize that part made a refrence. cool!!
I had almost thought of the ‘Define Dancing’ theme as being very close to the Jack & Rose moment in ‘Titanic.’
Your right, close. But I think it was better 
Titanic was the first thing I thought of when I saw that scene.
Titanic never popped into my head during that scene, really. It just seemed like physics, if you turn a ship on its side, everyone’s gonna fall.
Except there’s no such thing as up or down in space.
Makes sense only if you assume the ship acts relative to some sort of gravity generator.
Anyhoo, Titanic didn’t really pop into my mind. Never saw that movie, so that could be why. But regardless, that scene was crazy. One person I was seeing it with really cracked up during it. It’s cruel, I know, but hey, whatcha gonna do.
Well clearly they had artificial gravity on the ship, so I would assume that that gravity works in a general “top of the ship is up, bottom is down” way, but I don’t know anything about how artificial gravity works so I could be wrong. Although, regardless, they clearly meant for it to mean that the ship had an up and down, even if they got it wrong as to how that would work in space.
I’m confused about the artificial gravity. I remember that any opening to space makes the whole room weightless, and when the door’s closed…tssssseeewwww…kapcccchhhh!!!
I doubt that had anything to do with the artificial gravity aside from the fact that they stayed on the floor as it happened.
I actually viewed it as Axiom being ‘top’ heavy (meaning that relative to the artificial gravity, more of the ship was above the steering thrusters than below). Because of this, a [spoil]hard turn, perhaps during a struggle between AUTO and the captain, would cause the ship to lean out of the turn (the heavier part would swing out, just as on earth) and by the same principle that the ship swung out, the crew and passengers of the Axiom would be thrown to the side due to centrifugal force. You can test an application of this by putting water in an open bucket and swinging the bucket in circles…the water will stay glued to the outermost part of the bucket.
And even if Axiom were well-balanced (as you’d expect a ship to be) a hard, haphazard turn without the proper preparation might cause the ship to sway out anyway and have the same effect on the people inside.[/spoil]
Anyhow, it’s just physics…I didn’t once think of Titanic. (Unless he meant that one of the [spoil]ships EVE blew up had 'Titanic’on it[/spoil].)
Well that explanation definitely sounds like it makes sense. Good job, that’s the most convincing reasoning I’ve heard yet. I have a feeling it has some holes in it, but that is one theory to consider.
Yeah, that’s a pretty good explanation, eratosthenes! Aside from the fact that there’s no such thing as centrifugal force, it all pretty much makes sense, after all, [spoil]Auto turning his wheel either left or right would not in itself cause the ship to sway from side to side, rather turning left or right. And the Axiom does look very top-heavy, so your explanation does seem to work.[/spoil]
Centrifugal force exists. It goes outward from the center, but I think he was thinking of centripetal, which goes inward.
ominousorb- My physics teacher would disagree, but let’s not go there. 
But yeah, centripetal would apply to this case.
But you also have to take into account that the ship would be the gravitational center of the force. So, it being “top heavy” shouldn’t matter. The entire area of space around the ship would have had to have been surrounded by the same exertion of gravitational forces, which its not.
But if the ship is the only one effected then that would explain why [spoil]everyone fell once the ship turned[/spoil]
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Centrifugal_force
I took a lot at that, I see what you mean now. Wikipedia’s great.
Anyway … yeah, there is no top of the ship. And in regards to circular motion, I have a feeling that’s kind of off base. If we assume the central point of the movement is the center of the bottom of the ship, the people would be pulled to the floor instead of the corner, and anyway, the ship just wasn’t moving fast enough. Being top heavy would only be relevant if that became outward heavy as it moved in a circular motion … but not if it just makes that slow less-than-45 degree turn. And even then, the people wouldn’t fall to where they did, right? We might only be able to assume that up and down within the ship can change. Why it would be designed like that, I have no idea.