Review:  ”9″

The concept for the new animated film, 9, began as an 11-minute short film created by Shane Acker for a thesis project at UCLA. Recently released in theatres on 09.09.09, the short has been stretched to a 79-minute narrative, seen in real-time, through the eyes of the title character, 9 (voiced by Elijah Wood). While the film retains the same visually stunning animation found in the short, the plot, character development, and dialogue have all been stretched a little too thin in its translation to a feature length picture.

That said, the style in itself may make the film worth seeing. Directed by Shane Acker and produced by Tim Burton and Timur Bekmambetov, the movie’s visual style seamlessly portrays the aesthetic of a monochromatic landscape: one that is both alien in the silent and jagged edges of destruction, and yet familiar in its resemblance to real world war-torn cities. 9 joins a long list of recent films about the post-apocalyptic world, a genre that includes movies as varied and original as Wall-E, Children of Men, and The Road Warrior.

When 9 begins, Humanity has long been extinct, decimated by terrifying arachnidan machines with demonic red eyes. The lone survivors of the machine’s clanging attack on humanity are nine burlap sack people, hand-sewn with love by their scientist cum frankensteinian creator. Led by 1 (Christopher Plummer), the sack people had been hiding out for years in fear of the machines, though that all changes when 9 awakens at the beginning of the movie. 9, out of curiosity and compassion for the captured 2 (Martin Landau), leads a dangerous expedition against the machines to finally eradicate the fearful monsters once and for all.

It’s a straightforward story that follows along the same lines as other sci-fi films that pit humanity (or in this case, human-shaped burlap puppets) against the machines of their own creation. Genre pieces make for successful films when they unexpectedly defy convention—but 9 takes no such perogative. The sack people’s population dwindles rapidly, though none of the deaths are truly tragic, since the audience never gets emotionally invested in any of the characters. The friendship and cooperation among the sack people is touching, but as individuals, the burlap puppets fail to incite compelling emotions. Each is defined by one predominant characteristic: 1 is the cowardly king, 8 (Fred Tatasciore) is the fat brutish bodyguard, 7 (Jennifer Connelly) is the fearless female fighter, and 6 (Crispin Glover) is the eccentric mystic who annoyingly never gets out a full-sentence about how to save themselves until he is being snatched away by the evil Machine. Even the main character, 9, is a generic kind of hero—brave, compassionate, and curious—and that’s about it. The dialogue is similarly bland, and possibly even unnecessary, given the straightforward plot and the short film’s success with mute characters.

Given little plot and character development, the audience is forced to keep its attention by 9’s fast-paced action, which hurdles from one chase scene to another. The nonstop action borders on repetition but still never fails to make your heart race as you wonder how and when the next little burlap figure will be snatched away. This cheap suspense trick is used to great effect throughout the movie, substituting for the subtle dramatics of storytelling well done. The otherworldly landscape and the Machine’s predatory pursuit of the tiny sack people evoke the aesthetic of a War of the Worlds video game. The movie’s fight and flight scenes are incessant and intense, accompanied by metallic clanging and a vivid score. The viewer experiences 9 like he or she would a thrill ride, in momentary rushes and ebbs that are as quickly forgotten as they are felt.

The film ends on an uncertain note, veering erratically toward the mystical in its final moments. A few sack people are left, but the film gives no indication as to how they will proceed into their new world. The film leaves many how and whys unanswered, but the gorgeous aesthetics and heart-pounding action give you little time to ask questions.

By: Wendy Wang

Seppuku: A retrospective on the Japanese Samurai  

Last Saturday evening, those interested few who managed to locate 212 York St. were treated to a rare 35mm screening of Seppuku (better known in the U.S. as Harakiri), Masaki Kobayashi’s 1962 samurai drama. As the first of a four-part series showcasing the postwar period epic, presented by The Council of East Asian Studies, Seppuku made for a captivating introduction to a period of cinema unknown to most Westerners. In a mere 135 minutes—a venture into brevity for Kobayashi, whose magnum opus spans across a 10 hour trilogy—the samurai’s way of life is both glamorized and shockingly unveiled, presenting a foreign audience with a compelling, albeit bittersweet, narrative.

The film centers on Hanshiro Tsugumo (Tatsuya Nakadai), an enigmatic and aging samurai who presents himself to the House of Iyi in search of a suitable location to perform seppuku, a ritualistic disgrace-remedying display of honor. As horrific as this act might sound, the reserved and honorable nature of the samurai manifests itself in Kobayashi’s conservative cinematography, which involves very little gore until the film’s conclusion. In addition, Kobayashi spites chronological linearity, allowing Tsugumo’s enticing tale to unfold via a series of flashbacks that progress powerfully and climactically.

Shinobu Hashimoto, famously hailed as the screenwriter for The Seven Samurai, polishes his lucky number in this script with a core credited cast of seven, allowing Kobayashi the opportunity to establish and develop each key character. One might argue that Seppuku’s greatest shortcoming is in the one-dimensionality of the majority of its players, who render honest but shallow depictions of stock narrative characters. Nevertheless, Nakadai, Mikuni, and Ishihama, the leading male trio, provide enough introspective mystique to keep the viewer intrigued.

While the actors unfortunately present largely forgettable performances, this film’s irresistibility lies primarily in Kobayashi’s unique directorial style made apparent in the precise, and consequently beautiful, aesthetics of the film. Awarded the coveted Jury Prize at the 1963 Cannes Film Festival, Seppuku’s renown survives today due to a culmination of technological, conventional, and conceptual innovation that both engages the audience and directly presents itself as a feudal history lesson. Another unrecognized point of praise involves the use of the wide shot, a style and technology relatively new to cinematography in Seppuku’s time. Saturday’s well-preserved 35mm copy highlighted the fantastical intricacy Kobayashi consciously breathed into each shot, making the environments, from the minutiae of the Iyi chamber room to the lavishly wild-and-windy savannah, visually awe-inspiring and generally remarkable.

The film’s conclusion is similarly satisfying. Kobayashi delivers the revelation of mortality desired by the audience to merit a trip to the box office, but outperforms classic expectations by stinging viewers with a message both blunt and reflective in nature. Kobayashi’s final plot twist demands that the audience rethink the very foundation of the story, and by extension the very history of the code of the samurai used to ground the narrative. In both an homage to antiquity and a raw unmasking of a well known façade, Seppuku presents to the viewer a familiar image and then dares to reshape it. In the process, Kobayashi calls into question the very act of social presumption committed shamelessly by any modern moviegoer. Truly, Kobayashi the pacifist and Kobayashi the historian dissolve their dissonance in a true cinematic tour de force, making Seppuku a powerfully progressive film for all ages, and one worth experiencing by anyone who enjoys the thrilling tinge of humanity’s rawest revelations.

By: Jason Douglass