If Rag Dolls Could save the world...

There are a few fleeting moments of brilliance in Shane Acker’s 9, most of which come within the first 5 minutes. With images so magnificently animated and wonderfully nuanced, as the first of the film’s 9 main characters stumbles to life, we are filled with wonder about their existence. This magnificence is oh so short lived though. Acker’s film, inspired by his 2006 Oscar-winning animated short film, and co-produced by Tim Burton leaves the space of mystery its origins inhabit and clunks around on the big screen at just under 90 minutes.

The film’s plot, much like it’s landscapes is sparse. Instead it makes a big to do about action sequences that create stakes we are not really sure about, and characters with motivations that we are not really invested in. It is somewhere in the future or some alternate view of the past, and the only remaining remnant of life on Earth is a band of rag-doll esque beings who have been sparked with life by a late scientist. The team of 9, each go by their respective numbers, being named 1,2,3 etc… Our hero, voiced by Elijah Wood is the youngest, and quickly becomes intrigued with the decimation of Earth’s population and what his species now must do in response.

We learn that Earth’s destruction was wrought by (go figure) machines of the highest technological sort. The screenplay seems to pay no attention to this “its-all-been- done-before” approach. Instead it pens a human race that obviously never read their H.G. Wells and therefore was unaware that building a race of All-terrain, laser machines would only bring about our demise. Now the 9 remaining must fight “the beast” which has been placed into the story with no origin or explanation simply so that our heroes will have something to do for their on-screen time.

The film raises interesting questions left and right that are quickly swept under the rug with the most rudimentary discussions of battle-plan between the main characters. I don’t suppose I was expecting the rag-doll species to sit around and pontificate the vastness of their far-reaching effects on humanity, but needless to say the dullness of the dialogue makes for an uninspired story.

9 is a visually arresting film at times, but mostly it bored me to tears. It’s not a children’s movie, but I’m not sure adults will find much to chew on here either. Whoever it’s billed for, I hope they can stomach the thought of a world that exists solely for animators to run amok in, because 9 delivers, if only on that one order.

2/5

Tarantiono's Latest is Bold, Bloody, Propoganda

Quentin Tarantino’s Inglorious Basterds is a big, outlandish, bloody revenge movie that takes place in an alternate view of WWII. Its characters, like all of Tarantino’s, are larger than life. Some will love this film; others quite possibly could be repulsed. Nonetheless, Tarantino’s skills as a writer and director are clearly evident in this picture that is, to say the least, wildly entertaining.

The film’s characters are drawn broadly, and are the same archetypes we have probably seen in countless classic war B movies. Most of their actions approach satire as close as possible without going too completely far. The film opens with a wonderfully tense scene in which Nazi Col. Hans Landa (a star-making performance by Christopher Waltz) breaches the home of a young dairy farmer whom he believes is hiding Jews. His premonition, following a lengthy scene of vintage Tarantino dialogue, proves to be right. The lone Jewish survivor from the events that ensue is named Shosanna (Melanie Laurent).

One of the plots running parallel to hers is that of the esteemed American war group the Basterds. Led by Lt. Aldo Raine (Brad Pitt), these men pride themselves in killing Nazis. Raine, in his southern-boy war-hungry patriotic mind, boldly demands the scalps of 100 Nazis each from his men. Their mission is a kind of guerilla warfare tactic in which they promote fear amongst the Nazis, even if it’s the Fuehrer himself. One of them specializes in bludgeoning their enemies to death with a baseball bat. Pitt’s character opts to carve the Nazi emblem into their foreheads so they are “easy to identify” later.

Shosana’s story revolves around the screening of a Nazi propaganda film, to be shown in Paris with loads of decorated Third Reich officials. It is no coincidence that Tarantino creates his own kind of propaganda with the Basterds. They kill and maim in a way that is grotesquely comedic. It’s the kind of alternate vision to WWII that some uber-patriotic Americans have only dreamt about.

By the time the stories converge in a Parisian cinema in the last act of the film, the stakes have been set so incredibly high that it is virtually impossible to believe the demands will be met. That is, until you remember who is at the helm of this movie.

Basterds is revisionist history, you can be sure of that. It is a film though, like most of Tarantino’s work, that resists categorization. It’s shocking, outlandish, hilarious, savage, and stylish. It’s a film in which the normal rules of criticism don’t necessarily apply. When a director breaks all-known genre rules by transcending genre itself, it is much harder to stand in contempt than it is to just be swept away by its power.

4.5/5