BEFORE: I suppose I could have saved this film for Movie #900, or #999, or even Elijah Wood's birthday, but screw it. Earlier this week I was feeling rundown, then I got seven hours of sleep one night (a rare occurence for a weeknight) and I felt better. So these shorter animated features are very helpful.
Linking from last night, Sharlto Copley was in "The A-Team" with Jessica Biel, who was in "I Now Pronounce You Chuck & Larry" with Adam Sandler, who was in the recent "Just Go With It" with Jennifer Aniston, who was in "The Good Girl" with John C. Reilly.
THE PLOT: A rag doll that awakens in a post-apocalyptic future holds the key to humanity's salvation.
AFTER: Damn, I wish I'd known that this takes place post-apocalypse, I would have saved it for a later chain with "The Road" and "The Book of Eli". But I couldn't resist putting the two films with the number 9 in the title back-to-back.
This film is wildly inventive, and enjoys a great reputation in the animation community (I think) - but actually watching it, I found that it didn't make any sense. And I'm OK with fantastical, unlikely films as long as they make sense within their own realities, but this film gave me nothing to grab on to, explained nothing.
And any questions I had just went un-answered, and led to more questions - what is "The Machine"? How did all the humans die? What happened after that? How do you put a human soul into a rag doll? How, exactly, does all of this save humanity? It's just maddening.
Points for inventiveness, but no points for story or plot. You can't sell me a movie based only on its mood.
An aside about voice-acting, since I had to do some recording earlier today for an animated film. A couple months ago, I lent my voice to an animated production and I had to sound like a German general - and today I had to sound like an effeminate Frenchman. I know it's not easy - I have to workshop each character, just like any actor would - but in the case of Elijah Wood, he's basically being hired because the director wants a character to sound like Elijah Wood, so there's not as much heavy lifting involved.
Starring the voices of Elijah Wood (last seen in "The Ice Storm"), John C. Reilly (last seen in "The Good Girl"), Christopher Plummer (last seen in "Wolf"), Martin Landau (last seen in "Tucker: The Man and His Dream"), Jennifer Connelly (last seen in "He's Just Not That Into You"), Crispin Glover.
RATING: 3 out of 10 light bulbs
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