9 (2009)

Directed by: Shane Acker | 80 minutes | animation, war, adventure, fantasy, science fiction | Original voice cast: Elijah Wood, John C. Reilly, Jennifer Connelly, Crispin Glover, Martin Landau, Christopher Plummer, Fred Tatasciore, Helen Wilson

‘9′ is almost 90% action. The rest is the period before, after and between the action moments. Get ready for the blasts to shake in your seat, because things are going fast in ‘9′. Yes, it has a touch of science fiction because what is a possible future on Earth if humanity is extinct due to the machines they created themselves? Don’t expect to get a clear answer to this, sit back and let your imagination run wild. Assume that the Earth is almost completely destroyed and that apart from the evil machines only a few dolls remain. And that these dolls ‘live’. Later in the film, quite late even, it will be briefly explained that the soul of the creator/inventor is hidden in all these nine puppets. It is the same maker who invented the machines that first support the people and later turn against them. This man has incorporated nine aspects of himself into nine different dolls.

So there is No. 9 (Elijah Wood), the doll who thinks through and doesn’t just accept anything. The film begins and ends with him, you wake up with him and explore the area. In doing so, he soon runs the sympathetic Nr. 2 (Martin Landau), who wants to help him further. Unfortunately, No. 2 is taken by some sort of pitbull dinosaur robot that drags him into his lair: a mining area where all the bad machines reside. No. 9 wants nothing more than No. 2 from the clutches of this monster and goes against the will of Nr. 1 (Christopher Plummer) in the direction of restricted area. Fortunately, there is the heroine and ninja Nr. 7 (Jennifer Connelly) who comes to his rescue. Just when everything seems to be going well, No. 9 does not suppress his curiosity and thus inadvertently creates a terrible all-destroying monster: The Machine. The end seems near for all dolls, but No. 9 is not so convinced of this yet. Partly because of his sense of responsibility towards the other dolls, he does everything he can to save everyone.

Elijah Wood is nicely cast as the somewhat naive Nr. 9, Christopher Plummer as the slightly mean No. 1 too. A nice idea – especially for the variation – is that Nr. 7 to be a female doll. She is still the toughest doll of all. Jennifer Connelly is an unexpected but pleasant choice in this.

That ‘9′ is largely action-packed isn’t so strange when you thank the producers Jim Lemley and Timur Bekmambetov (both ‘Wanted’). The influence of the other producer, Tim Burton (‘Corpse Bride’, ‘Sweeney Todd’), is a little less obvious. Fans of Tim Burton will not immediately fall for ‘9′, it’s too much of an action movie for that. You can find him in the film in the small side characters in the film. The first scout of De Machine, for example, is a large pointed bat. Another scout is a snake with a doll face hidden in it, which also strongly resembles a skull. The mini bodyguards of The Machine all look like little spiders and the floating deformed hot air balloons have something magical about them. You don’t immediately get an association with Burton with the dolls themselves, except with No. 8 (Fred Tatasciore), the bodyguard doll of No. 1. He looks a bit like the Boogieman from ‘A Nightmare Before Christmas’.

The film ‘9′ is based on Shane Acker’s 11-minute short film that debuted at the 2005 Sundance Film Festival. As an animator and 3D specialist, he already delivered a beautifully detailed film. In the long version he elaborates everything a little further. The figures are designed so delicately as if he first put them together by hand and then in the computer. As if you can almost feel and smell the rough fabric. You can also see the development of the figures as the number increases. A different fabric is chosen and instead of buttons there will be a zipper. Not that No. 9 is better than No. 1, it does fit visually with the different characters. And it is no coincidence that No. 1 is the oldest and also the most afraid of change.

Shane Acker has a distinct style and with ‘9′ has created striking characters that did not exist before. Do you often have the idea with other films that the same can of characters has been opened again or is it clearly a hodgepodge of already existing characters, with ‘9′ the originality drips off. The dolls are adorable and look naive with their egg-shaped heads and large round eyes. It’s great that they have to save the world.

To turn a short film into a successful full-length film, it takes more than just beautiful images in a surprising fantasy world. And that’s where ‘9′ falls short. There is so much action that the story gets snowed under and that ultimately leaves a little bit of an unsatisfied feeling. ‘9′ especially overwhelms.