Movie Notes: Cube

February 12th, 2009

= 3 stars

Starring Nicole de Boer, David Worth, Maurice Dean Wint
Directed by Vincenzo Natali

Synopsis

Six civilians wake up in a windowless box. They soon realize they are trapped in a series of cubes, some of which are booby trapped. Can they escape?

The Good

• The film’s premise is solid, and thankfully, isn’t strayed from. The cubes’ intent, makers, and purpose is kept quite unclear, to where it could be a metaphor for life itself. We live, we die, and what we do with that time — stay in one place or strive to get ahead — is perhaps just a function of our personality and ultimately, meaningless.
• With the strange starting point and group of prisoners, the film resembles a sadistic reality TV show with a maddeningly difficult secret to figure out.
• The film pretty much takes place on one claustrophobic set. Keeping that in mind, occasional thrills are all the more impressive.

The Bad

• Overwrought acting. At times, the film demonstrates what would happen if you put several stock, cliched movie characters — as opposed to real people — in a dangerous situation together.
• Predictably, the flick subscribes to the Lord of the Flies vision of humanity.

Conclusion

Despite some cliched acting, as far as horror / thrillers go, Cube delivers. It starts with an intriguingly original premise and has the guts to stick with it to the end. Definitely worth a rental.

IMDB: Cube
Wikipedia: Cube
Rotten Tomatoes: Cube