9 (2009)

Our rating: 3 out of 5

Rated: PG13

reviewed by Shannon H.

If humans and all animal and plant life were wiped off the face of the earth, what would happen next? Some people would say that Earth would remain lifeless forever. Some might say that aliens would take over and repopulate earth. Others would conclude that those that are saved will be with God in Heaven while the condemned would perish in Hell. The film 9 explores the “what if” factor of a lifeless Earth.
 

It takes place in a post-apocalyptic Europe back in the 1930s and 1940s as machines and robots have wiped out all humans and almost all living things. A scientist has created nine robot-like rag dolls before promptly dropping dead. One of the dolls, labeled 9 (voiced by Elijah Wood), emerges from a heap of rubble and machine parts and is given his “voice box” by a doll labeled 2 (Martin Landau). Unfortunately for 2, he is whisked away by an animal-like machine back to a factory. Immediately, 9 joins forces with 5 (John C. Reilly) to rescue their friend despite the protests of 1, the leader of the group (Christopher Plummer), clad in a makeshift robe and pope’s miter. Along with the rest of the numbered dolls, 1 takes shelter in the tower of a battered cathedral. 
 
After the rescue of their friend 2, 9 finds a special talisman with symbols on it, which he mistakenly screws it into a machine that will literally suck the life out of any living creature by forcing the victim to stare at it. Realizing his mistake, 9 makes it his mission to retrieve the talisman from the machine. Unfortunately 1 and his bodyguard, 8, will have none of it, feeling that by staying safe, they could avoid death. Both 1 and 9 clash over ideology and how to go about surviving the soul-sucking machine and its various minions. While 9 is always “asking questions,” 1 prefers to avoid inquiry and stay in his figurative comfort zone. After the machine has claimed the lives of some of the dolls, 9 must figure out a way to stop the machine and release the souls trapped inside it.
 
The good news for this film is that there’s not even a hint of sensuality; no sex and no nudity. The language is squeaky clean with no vulgarity. However, there is a reason for the PG-13 rating. The violence, while not bloody or graphic (we’re dealing with robotic rag dolls), can be disturbing for some viewers and it is definitely not for children. A man is seen dead in his room, having collapsed from his soul being taken by the talisman. To me, the movie was like a PG-13 rated version of Coraline, except that 9 is less creepy. While there is no explicit drug use, a doll is seen putting a magnet to his head, enjoying some sort of “high” from the experience (his eyes roll back and his face slightly contorts in pleasure).
 
Spiritually speaking, 9 smacks of religious pessimism. The rag dolls do not depend on any higher power or even the foppish 1 for that matter. The atmosphere is a godless one; that in apocalyptic times, it’s every man (and rag doll) for himself. The leader of the group, 1, is seen dressed up in papal regalia (sort of) and takes refuge near the tower of what was left of the Notre Dame cathedral. He is opposed to all new ideas and that everyone should go back to the older ways of thinking, which may imply that the church is anti-progress. However, the surviving dolls are instructed that they are Earth’s last hope for population and the souls of the departed ascend into the sky. In a sense, the film is not exactly anti-spiritual but it’s not very spiritually redeeming. 
 
The computer graphics are stellar. Adapted from an eleven minute film short the director (Shane Acker) made in film school, the movie has the look and feel of a product from Tim Burton (one of the film’s producers). The computer graphics do an excellent job of giving the film a stop-animation feel to it. However, 9 does have its faults. It lacks character development and most of the characters are quite one-dimensional. The dialogue sounds contrived and it fails to add to the plot. The story is good but it feels forced, as if someone tried to put together a movie at the last possible minute. The flow is jumpy in some parts. Above all, the graphics and the animation are well done but the storyline and the dialogue are slightly below average. By no means is 9 the worst movie of 2009; it’s just that it lacks the depth that most Tim Burton productions have.