Rating: MMMM

Review of animated post-apocalypse noir 9, directed by Shane Acker and produced by Tim Burton and Timur Bekmambetov.

Director: Shane Acker
Starring: (voices) Elijah Wood, John C. Reilly, Jennifer Connelly, Christopher Plummer
Running time: 79 mins

9 is set in the wastelands of a post-apocalyptic world, following a war between humans and machines. With human life all but extinguished on earth, the only survivors are the numbered cloth bag characters and sinister red lens-eyed beasts, which have more in common with the Terminator than our soft-bodied heroes.

The film opens with a confused 9 (Elijah Wood) apparently lost in the wilderness of what used to be a city. He happens upon fellow cloth-bag 2, who is something of an inventor, managing to fix 9’s broken voice box. The pair are then joined by half-blind 5 (John C. Reilly) but their meeting is cut painfully short by the arrival of the ‘cat beast’, a devilish mechanical feline who captures 2 and carries him off to its lair. What follows is a daring rescue attempt which accidentally brings about the reawakening of the huge machine ‘brain’ which appears hell bent on wiping out every last trace of life on earth. For an animated film with characters that are undeniably cute (their huge Bambi eyes are the clincher), 9 is in no way another computerised story for children.

Packed with moments that are unsettling, frightening and challenging, 9 cements itself as animated fare for adults, to the film’s credit – there are enough genuine horror devices to push the film’s 12A rating, one of which is a horrible dementor’s kiss type sequence that is truly disturbing. The film’s premise and story is highly original and fresh, told with clever flashback sequences that are part of the action and not merely exposition for its own sake. 9 also fundamentally has good storytelling, an element that more filmmakers should prioritise a la Andrew Lasseter and his team at Pixar. Acker presents the characters as rounded and unique (despite being numbered, not named) with neat touches such as 6’s striped asylum-like clothing linking his madman persona and a scene in which fat stooge 8 apparently uses a magnet to get high.

The voice talent is good, with an impressive set of actors enlisted to provide the dialogue, including Christopher Plummer as the aging 1 and Jennifer Connelly as the high-kicking 7. Yet the actors are given a script of such weakness that its cliché ridden holes threaten to bring down a film of such promise. The dialogue is terrible, composed of one hackneyed expression after another, which is disappointing indeed as the premise and plot of the film is original and fresh. However, the film is saved by its unique visual style and its wonderfully endearing cloth bag characters, a clever meeting of the organic and artificial, with their soft bodies and metal parts. Overall, 9 is a well paced, well structured piece of sci-fi animation, beautifully told with moments of terror and poignancy. Great stuff.

Rating: MMMM

Rating: MMMM

Review of the hilarious and frightfully entertaining black-comedy road movie adventure, Zombieland.

Director: Ruben Fleischer
Starring: Jesse Eisenberg, Woody Harrelson, Emma Stone, Abigail Breslin
Running time: 88 mins

In the fictional America of Ruben Fleischer’s debut flick Zombieland, a terrible virus has infected the entire population, bringing about the zombie apocalypse. In the midst of the carnage remain only a handful of anonymous survivors, each adopting the moniker of the towns and cities they are aiming to reach in their attempt to cross the wastelands of America: geeky teen Jesse Eisenberg is Columbus, Woody Harrelson is the hard-as-nails Tallahassee while Emma Stone and Abigail Breslin are sisters Wichita and Little Rock. The film is essentially a road movie with a twist, that the road ahead is peppered with danger in the form of the walking undead (which don’t actually feature that heavily for a ‘zombie film’).

Eisenberg’s Columbus takes the lead role, as a nerdy loner who develops his own code of conduct for surviving – these rules flash up throughout the film as neat little intertitles, adding to the cool charm of the film – one of the rules is “limber up” and as Eisenberg stretches and prepares himself, so do the titles. His performance is very good, further cementing himself as a talent to watch, although he must take active precautions not to be typecast as the nervous good-hearted teen as has similarly befallen Michael Cera of Juno and Superbad fame. As the crazed weapon-happy Tallahassee, Woody Harrelson is fabulous, balancing excellent comic timing with kick-ass energy and carving a surprisingly developed role from a fairly two-dimensional character.  However, director Ruben Fleischer sells Abigail Breslin short of a great role, giving her not a lot to do except play the sassy and cute sidekick to Emma Stone’s big sister.

Zombieland excels at what it does – it is wildly entertaining, funny, charming, intelligent and pleasingly warm and hopeful. The black comedy moments are executed with panache, the dialogue is witty and clever and though purists may argue that the gore factor is relatively low (the film is rated 15), there is enough crawling flesh, violence and occasional shocks to satisfy those in want of high quality comic horror. Fellow zombie comedy-horror Shaun of the Dead may be more intelligent and have an enormous cult following, but Zombieland is arguably funnier, warmer and vastly more enjoyable. With a film this accomplished, you’d be forgiven for thinking that Ruben Fleischer had been making films for years – this is his debut feature but you’d never know. Even the soundtrack is suitably awesome, with the film’s punchy and stylish opening credits rolling along to the killer strains of Metallica’s ‘For Whom The Bell Tolls’. Let us hope and pray that a filmmaker this promising indeed marches on.

With its hilarious antics, deliciously violent horror set-pieces, moments of genuine pathos and a cameo that is just too brilliant to be revealed, Zombieland is the perfect popcorn film. It may not be profound, but it is damn good.

Rating: MMMM