The Box Movie Review
In The Box, Cameron Diaz stars as Norma and James Marsden is her husband Arthur. As the movie begins, we are told it is 1976, it is 5:44AM in Virginia and Norma and Arthur are sound asleep in their comfortable suburban home. A minute later the doorbell rings and Norma answers the door to find a box sitting on her step – THE box. In the box is another box with a glass case that has a red button inside of it. A key is needed to access the button. A note in the box indicates that Mr. Steward will be contacting them in 11 hours with more information.
At exactly 5 pm, Arlington Steward (Frank Langella) shows up at the door where he is greeted by Norma. They sit in the kitchen and he explains to her that if the button inside the box is pressed, her and her husband will be presented with $1 million. The one catch is that someone who they don’t know will die. Seems like a reasonable proposal. Arlington gives Norma the key to press, or not press, the red button and he leaves. Oh yeah, Arlington is missing a big chunk of his face because he was struck by lightning – or something like that.
So this is where, if you see this movie, you might have the big moral debate with your friends, colleagues, family, significant other – as to whether or not you would press the button. I’m sure most people would say “no” but I have asked three friends and two admitted outright, without hesitation, that they would press it. The third friend named four people that, if he knew specifically they would die, he would definitely press it. I, myself, would probably lean towards not pressing. I don’t think I could ever enjoy the money knowing that it killed someone.
Having this debate with people might be the best thing about seeing The Box because after Norma is explained what will happen if she does or does not press the button, this movie takes a big turn becomes one big clusterfuck of aliens, bleeding noses and ugly people. I’m usually pretty lenient on movies and I understand that a lot of hard work goes into making them so I don’t like sitting here on my high horse hidden behind a computer screen telling the world a movie sucks. In the case of The Box, I just can’t help myself. It was that bad. For some reason, it reminded me of that horrible Nicolas Cage movie from a few years back, The Wicker Man. It has the same type of tone and sort of the same type of story – and that’s not a good thing.
Perhaps the one redeeming factor in The Box is Cameron Diaz’s performance. She does a good job in one of the more serious roles I’ve seen her play in quite some time. It was nice to see her play a character that doesn’t have some guy’s load in her hair, or is getting dumped by a dude every minute or is in a drycleaners trying to explain a big white stain on her dress or worst of all, is in Vegas marrying Ashton Kutcher. She really holds her own in this movie and does quite a good job as a 70’s wife/mother/teacher who’s missing a few toes.
As for the rest of the cast, I can’t really say anyone else stood out. Even the great Frank Langella was a disappointment following his Oscar-nominated turn in Frost/Nixon. I found myself to be constantly distracted by whatever was going on with his face and found his character to be, in many scenes, a bit of a bore who didn’t really have anything interesting to say.
In the end, I will warn you to proceed with caution when it comes to The Box. Apparently if you are a fan of Donnie Darko director Richard Kelly or if you are a fan of The Twilight Zone, you are supposed to like this movie. Myself, I’m just a fan of a good, entertaining time at the theatre and I can assure you that The Box didn’t do this for me or most of the other 500 people who attended the screening tonight. Most people seemed to be walking out of the theatre like zombies once the movie was over. It was definitely one of my most painful theatre experiences of 2009. 3 out of 10
Comments
2 Comments on The Box Movie Review
-
MightyMad on
Sat, 7th Nov 2009 9:56 pm
-
Sven on
Sun, 8th Nov 2009 5:09 am
‘Don’t know about ‘painful theatre experiences’ (for what it was, I actually like this movie), but this flick is definitely a 70-style mindfuck, yet still remain quite watchable. Your audience probably had the same reaction mine had at the end of the screening – pretty much everybody was looking at each other, saying “what the hell was that?!”, but most of us took it as a silly, fun ride.
And it’s nice to see Cameron Diaz is still able to act – ‘haven’t see her do it in years!
I also liked the movie. It was very atmospheric and logical in it’s own way. Though it is a mainstream movie, you can see that Richard Kelly follows his own style. The seventies look and feel was very good. The performances were also great, especially with limited actors like Marsden, who was excellent.
Indeed silly andf fun! The movie was very well received in our theatre!
Tell me what you're thinking...
and oh, if you want a pic to show with your comment, go get a gravatar!
Follow Us
Support Us
Click here to buy posters!
