Country: USA
Genre: Horror / Sci-Fi / Thriller
Direction: Richard Kelly
Cast: Cameron Diaz, James Marsden, Frank Langella, James Rebhorn, Holmes Osborne, Sam Oz Stone
Norma and Arthur Lewis, a suburban couple with a young child, receive a simple wooden box as a gift, which bears fatal and irrevocable consequences. A mysterious stranger, delivers the message that the box promises to bestow upon its owner $1 million with the press of a button. But, pressing this button will simultaneously cause the death of another human being somewhere in the world; someone they don't know. With just 24 hours to have the box in their possession, Norma and Arthur find themselves in the cross-hairs of a startling moral dilemma and must face the true nature of their humanity.
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Movie Review:
Richard Kelly has once again made a film that confuses me. It's not the head-spinning, I need a chart to figure out the plot sort of confusion that Donnie Darko was. It isn't the "why did they need to expand more" confusion created by the director's cut of Darko. Nor is it that frustrating form of confusion caused by Southland Tales, where you wonder how this movie even got made when even the director doesn't seem to know what the movie's about. This is a different kind of confusing, as The Box is more than competently made, has a story that's easy to follow, and features terrific turns from all three leads, and yet it left me cold and not sure how I feel about it.
The Box is a typical Twilight Zone-movie, where an unnatural situation is thrown at a seemingly normal person, or peoples, who are then met with an ironic twist of some sort. M. Night Shyamalan has spent the last decade of his career repeating this formula. I digress. The Box is about a normal couple, Arthur and Norma Lewis. (James Marsdan and Cameron Diaz) who awaken one morning to their doorbell ringing. they answer the door, and what awaits them is a box. (Title). The box is nice, simple, ornate in design. Just a black box with a glass dome on top that encloses a button. The dome is locked, Norma, Arthur, and their younger son Walter are all confounded, until they find a card that informs them "Mr. Steward will call on you at 5 PM".
You know, it's at moments like this in movies that I recall that great Eddie Murphy routine, where he talks about why he would never last in a haunted house movie, because he'd up and leave from the first sign of trouble. Maybe I'm just too paranoid, but as soon as I see a box on my doorstep that doesn't have the familiar "amazon.com" logo, I'll call the police. I digress, again. Afterall, this is 1976, and people are more trusting.
Sure enough, Mr. Steward (Frank Langella) arrives at precisely the time he states, and makes Norma an offer that you probably already know if you've seen the trailer, or read the Richard Matheson story it was based on, or any of countless retreads of the same material. You have the titular box, it has a button, if you push the button you get $1 million (tax-free), but someone whom you don't know will die because of it. Clear, straightforward moralistic choice. It's not spoiling anything to tell you that they press the button, because if they didn't the movie would be really short and not worth watching.
What follows the pressing of the button, which is instantly regretted the moment it happens (Norma pushes it out of desperation and extenuating circumstances), is a lovely, bizarre trip through paranoia in an nation rocked by Watergate. What happens to the family, I will not spoil, because it's fun to know little about the film as possible, even if it ultimately leaves you (by which I mean me) a little cold by the time the final credits role.
The Box is most certainly NOT a bad movie. By all accounts, I should really dig it, but it just didn't quite do it for me. Although it's been some time since seeing it, and there are still things about it that are staying with me, begging me to watch it again. Not for "clues" or a greater understanding or clarification. I can't quite explain it.
One thing Richard Kelly never receives enough credit for is his ability with actors. The three leads do outstanding work. Cameron Diaz, who most people see headlining a movie and run the other way, actually does the best work, giving Norma a humanity that most movies of this ilk lack. It helps that she, and her husband, have real problems that you don't typically see in movies. (Sure, one of James Marsdan's problems is that NASA won't let him be an astronaut, but that's not nearly as implausible once you realize he already works for NASA). Diaz and Marsdan have a great chemistry, and reveal a family unit that's not dysfunctional, but quite loving and tender. And Frank Langella knocks it out of the park as Arlington Steward, the mysterious door-to-door "salesman" with a scar on his face reminiscent of a certain character in a recent bat movie. He's creepy and clinical, but also charming, and he holds it all together even when you discover his true motives. Tremendous work that rises The Box above most genre fare.
But there are some negatives in the film that got to me more than I thought would. As much as I like the comparisons to conspiracy thrillers of the 70s like The Parallax View and Invasion of the Body Snatchers, the stark look of the film has been oddly altered digitally, in a way I found more distracting than artistic. The music is by members of The Arcade Fire, and has moments that are very good and moments that are way too overblown, which is also my primary criticism of the band The Arcade Fire. And Richard Kelly really needs to knock it off with water effects playing a part in his narratives.
Still, I would never discourage anyone from seeing The Box. There's enough good things, and creepy imagery (the library scene is pretty damn spectacular) and great performances in it that differs from standard fare these days. I feel I admire the film more than I actually liked it, which is strangely becoming an acceptable criticism of movies these days. But when a movie actually tries for something more, whether or not it succeeds, it's always better than watching something by people who just wanted to get paid.
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