WBEZ and the Chicago International Film Festival are proud to screen Wall-E as the final film in our High Fidelity Film Series exploring science and film!

The doors of the Music Box Theatre will open at 6:30pm for general seating. At 7pm, we will screen this wonderful family film about robots, love & robot love. Following the film, Tricia Bobeda & Greta Johnsen of the Nerdette Podcast will moderate a conversation inspired by robotics with Kathleen McCarthy (Head Curator Museum of Science & Industry) and Kevin Lynch (Professor and Chair of the Mechanical Engineering Department at Northwestern University).

NOTE: This event is free to High Fidelity and Cinema/Chicago members but does require an advanced RSVP.  Seating will be first come, first served, and it is not guaranteed.  This event may be overbooked to ensure a full house. Please arrive 20-30 minutes before the screening starts.

ABOUT THE FILM

In the year 2700, years after mankind left the planet, Earth is a deserted, barren wasteland. Amongst the abandoned buildings and relics of the past lives WALL-E, a robot still spends each day doing what he was programmed to do: clean up garbage. Forgotten and alone, WALL-E collects our discarded history in solitude until he is visited by a sleek new robot named EVE, setting off an intergalactic adventure for love that includes a pet cockroach and an heroic team of malfunctioning misfit robots.

TRAILER: http://www.pixar.com/features_films/WALLE#Film-Trailers/node/3997

ABOUT THE POST-SHOW CONVERSATION

Nerdette is a podcast hosted by Greta Johnsen and Tricia Bobeda. It’s a safe space for nerding out about all the things you’re watching, reading, listening to and encountering IRL (“in real life”). They use “nerd” as a verb for the things you really, really, really love.

PODCAST: http://nerdettepodcast.com

Kevin Lynch is Professor and Chair of the Mechanical Engineering Department at Northwestern University.  He is a member of the Neuroscience and Robotics Lab (nxr.northwestern.edu) and former codirector of the Northwestern Institute on Complex Systems (nico.northwestern.edu).  Dr. Lynch publishes and lectures widely on his research in swarm robotics (designing and programming simple mobile robots to cooperate to perform complex tasks), robot manipulation (getting robots to manipulate the world more like humans and animals do), and human-augmentation robotics such as neuroprosthetics.

Before coming to Northwestern, Dr. Lynch received his BSE in Electrical Engineering from Princeton University and a PhD in Robotics from Carnegie Mellon University, and he spent a year in Japan as a postdoctoral fellow.  He is co-author of two books on robotics and the recipient of numerous honors and awards, including the top teaching awards given by Northwestern and its McCormick School of Engineering and Applied Science.

Kathleen McCarthy is the director of collections and head curator at the Museum of Science and Industry. McCarthy is responsible for the care of MSI’s 35,000 artifacts and those on loan for display, as well as the research and development of content for exhibits. Since joining MSI in 2000, McCarthy has overseen the development and installation of multiple exhibits and added high-profile artifacts to the collection. During the development of Robot Revolution, McCarthy spent several weeks in Japan visiting the top robotics companies. A key to the success of Robot Revolution are the relationships and knowledge she has built, and throughout the four-year run of the traveling exhibition, McCarthy will ensure the robots are updated to showcase the latest breakthroughs in robotic technologies. Prior to joining MSI, McCarthy was the registrar for the Haifa Faisal Collection of Saudi Arabian Artifacts. She has also worked for the Museum of Contemporary Art in Chicago, Krannert Art Museum, and taught glassblowing at the Toledo Museum of Art. McCarthy earned her MFA in Sculpture from the University of Illinois, during which she studied art history in Cairo. The recipient of a fellowship award from the Illinois Arts Council, her sculptures have been exhibited across the US and Japan