Up & Coming Weekly

24 UCW SEPTEMBER 30 - OCTOBER 6, 2009 WWW.UPANDCOMINGWEEKLY.COM Heather Griffi ths, Contributing Writer COMMENTS? 484-6200 ext. 222 or editor@upandcomingweekly.com The post-apocalyptic genre is always fabulous. There is some- thing about the idea of complete and utter destruction followed by the resurrection of human society that is extraordinarily compel- ling. If director Shane Acker had a challenge (other than the fact that he is just starting out) it was the lack of human characters in his seminal work to recreate the human soci- ety. In fact, one unduly harsh summation of the film reduced it to a bunch of stuffed bags running around. Luckily for the audience, 9 (79 min- utes) is far more than just bags running around! The plot is driven by the exten- sive characteriza- tion of what are essentially golems created by a brilliant sci- entist. Only slightly less intrigu- ing is the animated anthro- p o m o r p h i z i n g o f s e v e r a l m e t a l l i c c o n g l o m e r a t i o n s . The film opens with the "birth" of #9 (Elijah Wood). #9 is searching for the meaning of life, and his most salient trait is his naivety and compassion. From the beginning, we see the brave new world through the eyes of #9, and it is a devastated, green-tinged world. He eventu- ally finds #2 (Martin Landau), the inventor and explorer who p r o j e c t s a n a i r o f c a l m a n d q u i e t a u t h o r i t y . #9's meeting with #2 results in #5 (John Reilly) finding the newest golem in the ruins. The one-eyed healer is not a leader, but shows compassion and tries to do the right thing. Once in the care of #5, #9 meets #1 (Christopher Plummer), the clever but domineering leader of the canvas golems is reluctant to trust #9, for reasons that are later revealed. Soon after meeting #8 (Fred Tatasciore), an intimidat- ing addition to the cast, #5 and #2 set off on a personal quest. Judicious flashbacks are used to round out the per- sonalities of the creatures. Included in those flashbacks are #3 and #4, voiceless twins who have a more reflective personality than the others. Since they have no voice, you may find it intrigu- ing to picture the characters as female or male, and ask yourself why you place them in the cat- egories you do. Also appearing in the flashbacks are #6 and #7. #6 (Crispin Glover in an inspired bit of typecasting) is presented as a confused, obses- sive creation, and it might have been nice to get a little more back story on this particular character. The auda- cious #7 (Jennifer Connelly), on the other hand, is one of the best creations. She nicely subverts gen- der stereotypes by taking action where other characters hide, and by modeling bold ath- letic behavior where other char- acters are clumsy and ineffectual. During the journey of #9 and #5, certain truths are revealed about the source of the bodies and the scientist who manufactured our heroes (Alan Oppenheimer). Visually stunning, with an extremely adult oriented per- spective (There are bodies. Lots of bodies. And they are not Disney-fied), the film introduces a bleak perspective on the place of humanity in the world. Think of Brom's luminescent work on the story Plucker, combined with Toy Stor y's mutilated and broken toys and just a smidgeon of the Animatrix. Overall, the combina- tion is effectively desolate. And this is just the first of several highly anticipated Fall movies in the post-apocalyptic genre, including The Book of Eli, and Cormac McCarthy's The Road, which you should all go out and read immediately. Punk Rock Sensibility, Second The Poetry of the Apolcalypse 9 (Rated PG-13) by HEATHER GRIFFITHS

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