Movie review: 9

By Abby Olcese

Thursday, September 17, 2009

9 is a bit of a conundrum. To try and boil it down to its simplest synopsis, it’s a post-apocalyptic horror-thriller that, as an animated movie, would naturally seem marketed towards kids. But, with a PG-13 rating, it’s the kind of movie that seems to both appeal to and repulse children in the way Nightmare Before Christmas did for kids in the 1990s.

The story of 9 is that of a bunch of cloth dolls powered by wiring and willed into being by their creator, a scientist who we find dead at the start of the film. 9 (voiced by Elijah Wood) is the last of his creations, and takes it upon himself to lead the rest of his fellow dolls to conquer the evil machines responsible for destroying mankind.

9 was originally an Oscar-winning short by director Shane Acker, and it suffers from the same problems that face most movies expanded from a shorter form. The concept is established early on. The world in which 9 and the other dolls exist, and the rules they live by are set up pretty clearly within the first half hour. Beyond that, there’s not much development. The director seems to have reached a point where he’d already covered everything he’d covered in his original work, and just didn’t know where to go from there. After the setup, the plot proceeds to borrow from just about every post-apocalyptic movie out there, from Wall-E to Terminator.

However, those fans of dark movies, such as the work of Tim Burton (who serves as a producer) won’t be disappointed here. The atmosphere of 9 is suitably gothic and creepy. And yes, you can already get the T-shirts at Hot Topic, surprise surprise.

While overall 9 doesn’t add much to the world of animation, it’s a pretty decent movie to watch. And at roughly 80 minutes, it doesn’t demand much of your time. Audiences could do a lot worse.

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