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9 Movie Review

9 is a 2009 animated science fiction film directed by Shane Acker. It is one of the most underrated animated movies of its decade.

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“This world is ours now.

It’s what we make of it“

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After an apocalyptic war between humans and machines, the world is completely destroyed and void of human life. However, a ragdoll awakens in this world and it holds the key to humanity’s salvation. Back in 2005, Shane Acker made a short story of the same name that went on to be nominated for an Academy Award. Four years later, he turned his short into a feature, and the results were mostly satisfying.

It is difficult to say which of the two worked better as the short also had its problems, but was more to the point. The feature is surprisingly highly faithful to the original vision, maybe because the director himself adapted his own story, and this was done for better and for worse.

The runtime was way too fleeting for this particular story. The script demanded at least an additional twenty or thirty minutes of length given that the world created here was so expansive and the ideas so rich. The pacing was, thus, all wrong. The second act particularly suffered as there is a sense that we move from the beginning to the conclusion of the story without a proper middle section.

With that being said, the world building was so superb and richly detailed and the characters were more developed than they were in the short, leading to such an engaging science fiction tale that was also highly atmospheric. The atmosphere of danger, suspense and post-apocalyptic despair was beautifully conveyed here.

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The ragdoll creatures share a comradery and sibling dynamic that was quite sweet. Individually, they left a lot to be desired in terms of personality traits, but as a group they really worked. The death scenes were deeply felt as they were brutal and unexpected. The ending was still quite problematic and rushed, but it was also poetic in a way, so it was somewhat effective.

The various machines that we get to meet were all quite interesting and very menacing as villains. The action scenes were phenomenal throughout and quite thrilling while the darker tone to the story and some of the more disturbing imagery made for a wonderfully mature and adult take on the animated science fiction genre.

9 was at its best when it fully got invested in its world and ideas. The highlight was the flashback about the ragdolls’ creator. This was the deepest and most powerful scene in the entire movie and one that was gorgeously shot in black-and-white and quite revelatory in its plot. Shane Acker decided not to fully go into exposition territory, which was a sound approach as it led to a story that was explained just enough for us to understand it properly, but never too overanalyzed so that it attained mysticism and intrigue.

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9 is beautifully animated. I still do contend that a stop-motion technique would have fitted this material more, but the CGI as it was employed here was different, polished and imbued with a darker color aesthetic with more subdued and gloomy hues that were so effective. The sound design was fantastic, the score was superb and the movie’s directing was solid, but the dialogue was unnecessary and a silent treatment would have been better in this instance.