The Week in Film: Stitchpunk, murder on ice and on campus, and hot new trailers

Now that Ben Lyons has gotten the boot from At the Movies, we no longer need to yell, "You lie!" at our TV screens each week. And with summer behind us, let's see what's shaking this week on the big screen.

Opening on 9/9/09 was, of course, 9, a bleak but beautiful animated feature about doll-like creatures — they're already calling the style of this stop-motion animated feature "stitchpunk" — fighting for survival in a bleak post-apocalyptic landscape.

While the storyline didn't thrill me, I was taken by director Shane Acker's stunning visuals and by his ability to create distinct personalities for his lead characters (who all have names such as 9, 2 and 6).

He's helped greatly with the latter by a terrific cast of actors, including Elijah Wood, John C. Reilly, Martin Landau, Christopher Plummer, Jennifer Connelly and Crispin Glover. 9 is way, way too bleak and disturbing for little kids — who should totally see Ponyo if they haven't already — but it's an impressive debut for Acker.

9 is based on his original short film of the same name, which can be viewed right here: