In a post-apocalyptic world where life as we know it apparently ceases to exist, nine strange robot-like dolls — known as “stitchpunk” dolls by the director — are found wandering the landscape on a puzzling quest while nightmarish machines, seemingly hellbent on eliminating them, loom around every corner.

This is the plot for “9,” released on 9/9/09.

Originally a 2005 11-minute animated short with entirely silent characters, “9” is now a 79-minute feature film of gothic techno fantasy and well-cast celebrity voices. The main character, stitchpunk 9 (Elijah Wood), searching for answers and adventure, is joined, initially, by eight other stitchpunks. The relevant surviving stitchpunks are voiced by: Christopher Plummer, Martin Landau, John C. Reilly, Crispin Glover and Jennifer Connelly.

They seek the basic wants of most sentient beings: survival, companionship, adventure, home and most importantly, answers to the age-old quandary, “Where do I come from and why?” They also seek the answer to question of, “What they are made of and how do they function?”

If this doesn’t wet your appetite for science fiction, nothing will.

Bombed-out exteriors and burnt-out interiors make for a strange, yet familiar, world recognizable to audiences as a what-could-be Earth. The classic idea of robots becoming the remaining beings after man has passed are illustrated sensationally with ghoulish WWII kick-back machines sporting predatorial animal qualities — these things look cooler than the cyber squids of “The Matrix.”

The creator and director of this eerie alternate-universe is Oscar nominated Shane Acker. “9” is his first big film and certainly won’t be his last. Acker drew inspiration for the creation of his stitchpunks and their world from the works of “9” producer Tim Burton, twins Stephen and Timothy Quay’s 1986 stop-action short “Street of Crocodiles” and the 1989 short “Balance” by twins Christoph and Wolfgang Lauenstein. As an homage to these works, two of the stitchpunk dolls are twins and the world they inhabit looks like a page out of Burton’s imagination.

“9” offers all the beauty modern computer animation can offer, with a style that feels as hand-crafted, carefully drawn as the Disney classics from days gone by. But, this film is a whole lot darker. This film is not aimed for the thumb-sucking types — it would likely scare them — and will only appeal to younger children that dig the creepy and fearsome subject matter. The real target audience is the adult crowd looking for stunning art who still enjoy animation. The downside to the flick is in the personalities of the stitchpunks. They aren’t anything new or amazing. Their personas are your classic fighter, sage, hero, scientist, etc. Although, this minor annoyance doesn’t matter a great deal as everything looks so spectacular. The ending is okay, but won’t leave you in wonderment.

As said before, the visuals are the real draw. Catch this flick when you get the chance, it’s worth a $9 ticket.

—Gabriel Stoffa is a senior in communication studies and political science from Ottumwa