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9
Mixed or average reviews
Based on 31 critic reviews
How did we calculate this?
Based on 61 votes
Read user comments
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Movie Info
Genre(s): Adventure | Animation | Fantasy | Sci-fi
Written by: Pamela Pettler
Directed by: Shane Acker
Release Date:
Theatrical: September 9, 2009
Running Time: 79 minutes, Color
Origin: USA
Summary
RATING: PG-13 for violence and scary images
Starring Elijah Wood, Jennifer Connelly, Martin Landau, Christopher Plummer, John C. Reilly, and Crispin Glover
The time is the too-near future. Powered and enabled by the invention known as the Great Machine, the world’s machines have turned on mankind and sparked social unrest, decimating the human population before being largely shut down.But as our world fell to pieces, a mission began to salvage the legacy of civilization; a group of small creations was given the spark of life by a scientist in the final days of humanity, and they continue to exist post-apocalypse. With their group so few, these “stitchpunk” creations must summon individual strengths well beyond their own proportions in order to outwit and fight against still-functioning machines, one of which is a marauding mechanized beast. While showcasing a stunning “steampunk”-styled visual brilliance, 9 dynamically explores the will to live, the power of community, and how one soul can change the world. (Focus Features)
Also On The Web: Internet Movie Database Official Studio Site
What The Critics Said
All critic scores are converted to a 100-point scale. If a critic does not indicate a score, we assign a score based on the general impression given by the text of the review. Learn more...
Boston Globe Wesley Morris
Any optimism in 9, which is bound to try the fortitude of meeker children, feels hard-won. It actually ends in a bittersweet mystery.
Read Full Review >Entertainment Weekly Lisa Schwarzbaum
Storyboarded with precision, and enhanced with a resonant score by Deborah Lurie, Acker’s handsome, feature-length 9 is, for all its visual flights of fancy, grounded in an apocalypse-proof message graspable by any schoolchild.
Read Full Review >Portland Oregonian Shawn Levy
At barely an-hour-and-a-quarter in length, it's one of those very rare feature films that you wish were longer.
Read Full Review >San Francisco Chronicle Peter Hartlaub
Taking your very small child to this movie is only a slightly better idea than a trip to "The Final Destination." With that warning out of the way, this action adventure is a big treat for more mature animation and science-fiction fans and a triumph for the young director.
Read Full Review >New York Post Lou Lumenick
IF you ask me, Shane Acker's post-apocalyp tic animated film 9 is better than the live-ac tion flick "District 9." Beyond their similar titles, these sci-fi social commentaries are both expanded from shorts under the sponsorship of a world-class director.
Read Full Review >The Globe and Mail (Toronto) Stephen Cole
Watching 9 , we know how 8 feels. Sci-fi fans will find heaven in Shane Acker's feature-film debut.
Read Full Review >The Onion (A.V. Club) Tasha Robinson
It’s a perfectly functional, fairly scary kids’ film, with plenty of craft and creativity to keep adults occupied. But with a story as sophisticated as its visuals, it could have been much more.
Read Full Review >ReelViews James Berardinelli
This is post-apocalyptic adventure as imagined for a teen crowd, and what it lacks in depth it makes up for in action. With a slight running time of 80 minutes, 9 doesn't contain an ounce of fat on its animated bones.
Read Full Review >Chicago Sun-Times Roger Ebert
The best reason to see it is simply because of the creativity of its visuals. They're entrancing.
Read Full Review >Baltimore Sun Michael Sragow
Not a perfect 10, but its imperfection is what makes it gripping and bewitching.
Read Full Review >The New York Times A.O. Scott
Every effort to expand the range of feature-length animation beyond the confines of cautious family fare is to be welcomed, and budding techno and fantasy geeks are likely to be intrigued and enthralled.
Read Full Review >The New Yorker Anthony Lane
And here's the strangest thing of all: it works. [September 14, 2009, pg.ll4]
New Orleans Times-Picayune Mike Scott
9, though animated, isn't really a movie for kids. The problem is that, despite its strikingly original set-up and its cool steampunk visual vibe, it's not much of a movie for grown-ups, either.
Read Full Review >Rolling Stone Peter Travers
I only wish this richly imaginative movie had stayed truer to the dark heart of its visuals.
Read Full Review >Chicago Tribune Michael Phillips
Something has gone slightly awry, however, en route from the 11-minute film to the 79-minute edition of 9.
Read Full Review >Miami Herald Connie Ogle
The film isn't particularly original, but its dark mood, end-of-times landscape and unique characters will seem fresher to the young audience for which it's aiming than to jaded sci-fi veterans.
Read Full Review >Philadelphia Inquirer Carrie Rickey
In 50 years, film lovers will look back on 9 as the debut feature of an original talent.
Read Full Review >Time Out New York Keith Uhlich
Sobering stuff for an animated movie that pitches itself somewhere between cutesy children’s entertainment and hectoring Grimm’s fairy tale. The problem with 9, though, is that it lacks a consistent tone.
Read Full Review >Village Voice Scott Foundas
The result is never as gripping in narrative terms--a well-worn litany of dystopian-future chestnuts--as it is visually.
Read Full Review >Variety Todd McCarthy
Design aspects are arresting and the filmmaker's abilities are obvious, but the basic survival story remains slight, just as the general setting, no matter how artfully imagined, is by now pretty familiar.
Read Full Review >Washington Post Michael Cavna
Does 9 rival last year's "Wall E" as the best post-apocalyptic "cartoon"? The short answer is Nein. 9 is, however, a visual stunner.
Read Full Review >New York Daily News Elizabeth Weitzman
Shane Acker's underwritten but beautifully animated debut is both an ode to technology and a warning against it. Perhaps unintentionally, the film itself echoes those themes.
Read Full Review >Slate Dana Stevens
Danny Elfman's swooping orchestral soundtrack only adds to the sense of by-the-numbers familiarity. Elfman's signature sound is so associated with Tim Burton movies that it overwhelms this film's chances of carving out an aesthetic space of its own.
Read Full Review >Austin Chronicle Marc Savlov
This expanded version only suffers, albeit in grim visual splendor, from the extrapolation.
Read Full Review >Salon.com Andrew O'Hehir
Actually, the problem with wunderkind director Shane Acker's "stitchpunk" animated fantasy 9 isn't so much that it bears a sped-up, dumbed-down resemblance to "The Lord of the Rings," although it does. It's more that Acker's dark and whimsical creation, so clearly in the tradition of his mentor Tim Burton, is wondrous to behold but offers only an indifferent and generic mishmash of quest fantasy and post-apocalyptic science fiction when it comes to story.
Read Full Review >Chicago Reader J.R. Jones
Shane Acker has expanded his Oscar-nominated short 9 into a full-length feature whose splendid visuals are dragged down by a tedious story.
Read Full Review >The Hollywood Reporter Kirk Honeycutt
9 never adds up to much. It's a dark adult film that gives itself over to the chases and frights of a kiddie movie.
Read Full Review >USA Today Claudia Puig
Long on imaginative design but less substantial in narrative, this dreary story of fighting the power is more numbing than thought-provoking.
Read Full Review >St. Louis Post-Dispatch Calvin Wilson
Although it has a great look and offers a few thrills, the animated film 9 is one of this year's biggest disappointments.
Read Full Review >New York Magazine David Edelstein
For all the Saturday-matinee heroics, the movie is dreary and monotonous, the vision junky in more ways than one.
Read Full Review >Film Threat Nick Antosca
The nine characters aren’t machines, exactly, but they aren’t people or animals either. They’re little cloth pouches that can move, communicate, and make facial expressions that range from ornery to cute. At some point during the movie I began mentally referring to them as the Owlish Beanbags.
Read Full Review >What Our Users Said
The average user rating for this movie is 6.4 (out of 10) based on 61 User Votes
Note: User votes are NOT included in the Metascore calculation.
Rick A gave it a7:
I thought it was creative for something animated that had a little different story line and unique feel to the characters. I liked it but not enough to see it twice or three times like I did Coraline. It is worth the money.
Judy T gave it a5:
This movie is too scary for kids and too uninteresting for adults. It has great visuals and animation but suffers from what most recent hollywood movies suffer from- bad writing. All the good writers have gone to TV, maybe hollywood should go look there.
Alec H gave it a9:
Minor spoiler. The main reason I decided to write a review is to respond to the review by Chris S. The sack people were never meant to reproduce. There was no flaw in their creation. If you recall at the end of the movie when 9 releases the others' souls and they float up into the sky, it begins to rain. In the rain are little green blobs. This is life starting anew. So you see, they actually did succeed in their mission to save the future. The only real problem I had with the movie is that it was too short. If the plot had been developed just a little more and the action scenes extended, then this would be getting a full 10 out of 10. It is visually stunning and full of action. This is a must see!
A nonomouys gave it a9:
Very good. the story wasnt as bad as some people say and the characters were fleshed out to the point were it was enough. The action was just phenomenal, and the same goes to the animation and VA.
S Lynn gave it a3:
Disappointing for a movie billed with Tim Burton's name. It's apparent that's all they paid him for. I'd like to say the plot was interesting, but it wasn't. I guess the lesson is: if all humans are dead, who is left to care about a bunch of dolls? Also, this was not a movie for little kids. It's not just the fairly horrific scenes of dead bodies, but also the post apocalyptic theme that is fairly hard to grasp the ramifications of, even for an adult.
Nathan H. gave it a6:
The beginning of this movie had me interested. The characters and the world are top-notch and very well designed. The machines in the film are a huge let down though. They are ideas that have been done a thousand times before(with the exception of one near the end of the film). The characters start out strong, but are never developed more than they start out to be. The action is well done and the best aspect of the film surprisingly. The ending(imo) was just stupid. I'd say wait for DVD and Blu-ray and then rent it. I expected a bit more than what I got.
-=e=- gave it a3:
This movie, while visually stunning, had a thread-bare plot that has been done so many times that it's hard to find something new to be excited about. If only more time was spent on the script, character development and plot this would have been a rare film. As it stands its a beautiful but retarded child of Terminator and the Matrix. A sad waste of money and talent.
