The idea of machines outsmarting and destroying humankind is nothing new in the movies - remember 2001: A Space Odyssey, The Terminator movies, The Matrix movies and more. And if it weren't for the twill puppets, Shane Acker's 9 -- a computer-animated feature expanded from his 2005, Oscar-nominated short of the same name -- really wouldn't have that much to add to the conversation.
Advertisements for the film peg Acker as a "visionary director". The claim is PR hyperbole to be sure (9 is his feature debut), but in the strictest sense of the phrase, the ads may have a point.
Brave New World, Same Old Story
9 is quite a sight to behold on the big screen -- if not the work of a visionary, then certainly a film from someone with one hell of an imagination. His little twill puppet heroes (think sock puppets, but more thread, needle and wire) are literally placed at ground level for the post-apocalypse.
It's a sad, bombed-out world Acker dreams up, pulled from the nightmares of Hiroshima, Dresden and other World War II casualties (the elaborate churches and broken statues seem to suggest a European city, actually). The robot machines have already won. Only remnants of the quelled human revolution remain, in posters spotted through the rubble.
But from the rubble come a band of small puppet figures, brought to life for the purpose of restoring humanity. These survivalists are machines as well, though something distinct sets them apart from their larger, scarier enemies -- it's a major plot point, one of the story line's hokier elements that becomes key in the denouement.
A Band Of Twill Brothers
The film opens with 9 (voiced by Elijah Wood) coming to life at the hands of his master, an elderly scientist pouring the last of his life into this woven figure. As 9 soon discovers, he's not alone -- there are eight others of varying size and weave. Some -- the self-appointed leader, 1 (Christopher Plummer) believe in isolationism and survival. Others -- 2 (Martin Landau), 7 (Jennifer Connelly) -- take to the streets, seeking out a way to forever defeat the preying machines.
To re-hash the plot further would be superfluous -- you can more or less connect the dots and figure where things are going with the elements in place. The meek 9 turns courageous after the war machine sparks back to life, stronger than its ever been since the apparent eradication of humankind.
There are plenty of loud chases, explosions and showdowns with the creepy, crawly disciples of the main Machine (The Brain, so to speak), and less than 80 minutes from the start, roll credits.
The Stuff Nightmares Are Made Of
What stands out is the painstaking conceptual design, not the actual story being told.
Screenwriter Pamela Pettler doesn't give any of the assorted puppet people much of a character identity past their physical and vocal differences. They're completely archetypal -- the newcomer/outsider, the stern leader, the wild warrior, the brute, the sidekick (John C. Reilly) and the crazy one who knows all (Crispin Glover).
The script has the right idea in cribbing from the best, echoing bits of The Lord of The Rings and Ralph Bakshi's crazed anti-war cartoon, Wizards at times, even Don Bluth's darker works (The Secret of Nimh, parts of An American Tale). Acker's real talent is in relaying -- through purely visual terms -- the mechanical hell that the world has come.
Strange, though, that such a message should come from a computer-animated, not hand-drawn, feature. But there is a definite liveliness to 9's animation, even if the world it portrays is largely dead.
The baddies come from the dark mind of a machine trying to imitate flesh-and-blood creations (the same could be said of computer animated, mo-cap disasters like Polar Express) and are truly horrifying. These freaks of anti-nature -- and those resilient twill protagonists -- are what resonates strongest in 9.
It's a shame the tale spun around them isn't half as inventive.
RATING: 3 out of 5 stars
VERDICT: Visually brilliant, 9 could have been one of the new animated classics, next to fellow Focus Features release Coraline. But as the plot goes from familiar (read: tired) to absolutely hokey, all that lingers from 9 is its artistry.
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