The 80-minute CG feature from director/writer Shane Acker, 9, grossed over $40 million at the box office before heading to DVD. Not than anyone but me is keeping track, but 9‘s namesake Nine, the live-action feature from Academy-award nominee Rob Marshall, opened with only $5 million last weekend. Acker’s post-apocalyptic tale opened with $10 million, and hits DVD shelves today. Take that, living, breathing actors!

CTN-X (the CTN Animation Expo) kicks off this Friday in Burbank, and runs through to Sunday, November 22nd. There’s heaps of great panels and speakers over the 3-day event, and I was lucky enough to be invited to participate. I’m hosting a panel titled 1 + 3 + 5 = The Making of 9, where I’ll be quizzing a number of crew members about this feature film. Shane Acker, the creator and director of the CG-project will be on stage, and afterwards the team will be available for Q&A.

By Keith Staskiewicz

The season of animation is upon us. The hotly-anticipated new feature 9, not to be confused with the upcoming musical Nine nor the German negative “Nein!” arrived yesterday in theaters on 9/9/09, making it the most numerologically apt release date since the June 6, 2006 unleashing of the Omen remake.

And after 9, the deluge. From now until the end of the year we’ll be seeing an unprecedented avalanche of animation hitting mainstream American cinemas, and one that demonstrates just how many formats can huddle in under the medium’s single umbrella. We’ll see a not-so-classic adaptation of a much-adapted classic, an eagerly awaited return to form, the ambitious realization of a long-gestated original vision, and a live-action auteur’s first foray into animation, among many others, brought to us via CGI, stop-motion, traditional hand-drawn cel, and the latest performance-capture technology. It’s a good time for animation fans.

9

Focus Features and Starz Animation
September 9

In between putting finishing touches on orcs and trolls for the Lord of the Rings at Peter Jackson’s famed Weta Workshop, Shane Acker worked for over four years on a short film that would eventually be nominated for an Academy Award in 2005. Now, another four years later, his meticulously imagined world of ragdoll protagonists, apocalyptic malaise and an entire mechanical ecosystem of things that go bump in the night, is coming to the big screen. 9 is produced by Tim Burton, a man who also likes his fairy tales on the darker side, and Timur Bekmambetov of Wanted fame, and features the voices of Elijah Wood, Jennifer Connelly, Christopher Plummer and John C. Reilly. Expanding on the mythology established in the 11-minute short and giving vocal cords to the once silent characters, Acker follows nine sentient dolls as they try to unravel their own existence as well as the terrible fate that has befallen humanity, both of which might be tied together in what Acker has dubbed “a Geppetto/Oppenheimer figure.”

Expect the film to be dark and genuinely scary. I had the opportunity to speak with Acker a number of months ago and he emphasized his desire to lend the film a genuine aura of fear and peril: “What I’m trying to evoke here is fairy tales, the real ones. They were moral tales and there needed to be severe consequences to teach those lessons. (In) some of these animated films nowadays, you don’t feel like there are any stakes. It’s set up so much as a series of gags. You don’t really feel the nature of the threat. But I tried to make that threat present in 9.” The TV ads have warned that 9 is “definitely not your little brother’s animated movie,” which sucks for my little brother, because he, like myself, thinks it looks totally badass.

Apple and the Rock Band video game both jumped on the 09/09/09 bandwagon and are launching products today, but Shane Acker’s CG is the most organic fit for the date. On the heels of District 9 and $9.99, Focus Features’ 9 arrives in theaters today, buoyed by somewhat positive reviews. We’ll see if the Coraline audience leaps out of their seats and illustrates yet again that animated features aren’t just for kids.

The CG-animated feature 9, which was animated at Starz Animation and released by Focus Features arrives in theaters on September 9th (and the reviews, so far, a definitely positive). To whet your appetite, below is a 4-minute featurette featuring footage from the film, and interviews with cast members (including Crispin Glover), producer Tim Burton and director/writer Shane Acker:

… and here’s a new sneak peak clip in which 9 saves 7.

The term “animated feature film” has typically meant “family film with zanny talking animals.” More recently, with films like Corpse Bride and Coraline, a new era is upon us – one in which films aimed at an older audience are getting bigger budgets and finding bigger audiences. This new TV spot for Shane Acker’s CG feature 9 (opens September 9, 2009) drills that exact point home.

… and here’s an interview with Shane Acker from Comic-Con:

9 weeks until 9. Shane Acker’s CG feature 9 arrives in theaters on 09/09/09, and on that day popcorn will cost you…. $9 dollars. While you arrange for that loan, enjoy a 4-minute clip from the film, featuring the wicked winged beast. 9 was animated at Starz Animation in Canada.