9

Focus Films, 2009, now on Netflix

Directed by: Shane Acker, written by Pamela Pettler, and produced by Jim Lemley, Tim Burton, Timur Bekmambetov, and Dana Ginsburg

Starring: Elijah Wood as 9; Christopher Plummer as 1; Martin Landau as 2; John C. Reilly as 5; Crispin Glover as 6; Jennifer Connelly as 7; Fred Tatasciore as 8 and a Radio Announcer; Alan Oppenheimer as the Scientist; Tom Kane as the Chancellor

Based on 9, director Shane Acker’s original 2005 short film.

Next Gen must have put me in the mood for dark, animated movies featuring non-living AIs, because 9 was the next thing I watched. It’s not new (2009) and while not a blockbuster, it did reasonably well, racking up $44 million in ticket sales.

The story takes place in the ruins of a city, and the rusted hulks of cars suggest that this catastrophe struck sometime around 1940. The tattered red, white and black flags suggest that this world’s corollary was destroyed by a group similar to Hitler’s Nazis.

Tim Burton’s presence makes itself notable, and the wreckage is very convincingly post-apocalyptic. There are no signs of life at all.

What there are moving are 9 little figurines, constructed of burlap, bits of copper, and indefinable chucks of machine-like parts. They are self-aware, and grimly cling to an existence that seems utterly futile. They can’t reproduce, and eventually the skeletal cat-like machine that is stalking them will eventually destroy them.

5 is late to the party, ‘waking up’ in a mad scientist’s aerie some decades after the Event, and quickly encounters 2, who seems the only one interested in trying to improve their lot. In bring 5 back to join the others, 2 is killed by the mechakitty, and as a result, 5 is off to an awkward start with the remaining seven.

Each has its own personality with the exception of 3 & 4, who seem to share the same personality. Those two never speak, and in some utterly undefinable way, I think one is ‘female’ and the other ‘male’. I think 3 is the boy doll.

We learn fairly late in the movie that each doll is an aspect of their creator’s soul—the body in the office in the opening scene. I think if they had played up the aspects of the different dolls more, and perhaps had them speak in the same voice, and let the viewer figure it out, it would have made for a stronger story.

The ending of the movie is annoying. There’s an obviously-tacked-on development, a sudden rain falling that contains micro-organisms, a ham-handed way of dealing with the existential despair of the situation the dolls are in that is both forced and utterly unconvincing, not to mention incoherent. It reminded me unpleasantly of David Lynch’s version of Dune. Same really stupid ending. Not doing that might have opened the doors to ensuing movies where the dolls could come to grip with the sterility of their world and perhaps devise a solution.

Despite all this, the movie is worth watching. The visuals are absolutely gorgeous, Burton at his dark best, and perhaps knowing in advance the nature of the dolls will make it a bit stronger plot. Just exit in the final 15 seconds and you’ll be fine.

Now on Netflix.