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36 out of 51 people found the following comment useful :-
Uneventful, 5 November 2009

Author: David Budo (Dbmovie@hotmail.com) from Canada

A box with a button provides a couple with the opportunity to be financially free, but the cost is the life of someone they've never met. This is a very tedious film to watch. Richard Kelly, who wrote and directed it, decided to make a film without any payoff. You are taken on a ride of slow build ups, one after the other with minor revelations at best. At certain moments, I thought to myself, this will have major significance at the end, but nothing does. The film just leaves one thinking, "This story could have been told in 30 minutes, without all the stretched out nonsense." I will hope you avoid this god-awful film and maintain your sanity by doing so.

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32 out of 48 people found the following comment useful :-
The Box is one film this year that should have been shelved., 26 October 2009

Author: Biggest_Loser from Australia

*** This comment may contain spoilers ***

In 1976 a mother named Norma Lewis (Cameron Diaz) lives with her son Walter and her husband Arthur (James Marsden). One night a box is placed on the doorstep of their home and the following morning they cut open the box to reveal a button device that must be opened with a key. By the late afternoon, a man with terrible scarring on his face comes to their door and presents Norma with an offer. This man is Arlington Steward (Frank Langella) and he announces that if they push the button someone in the world that the family does not know will die and they will receive a million dollars in cash. If they don't press it, nothing will happen and the offer will move on to someone else. Norma and Arthur are not allowed to tell anyone including their son about this deal. The incentive for the family to push the button is heightened by their financial difficulties. Arthur, who is currently working for NASA, fails to be accepted into a new job he applies for and Norma, who is a teacher, learns that her faculty funding is being cut.

One's enjoyment for this bizarre sci-fi thriller, based on the short story "Button Button" by Richard Matheson, will be determined by how far they are willing to take this ludicrous premise. The opening of the film is particularly problematic in grounding itself in a sense of realism with the household. Richard Kelly's previous film Donnie Darko cleverly used the condition of schizophrenia to justify its excursion into paranormal activity and parallel universes. Without the dream-like state of that far superior film, The Box and the very thought of a device that can kill anyone in the world, is entirely implausible. That Norma would also accept someone into her house that has almost the same scarring as Two-Face from The Dark Knight and believe this offer, seems equally contrived.

If this sounds unlikely so far, what follows is even more absurd, involving a conspiracy about someone who was struck by lightning, the possibility of alien life or some other Godly being influencing these situations. Scenes involving gateways opening up in public libraries, random nose bleeds and mindless drones stalking the Lewis family, become almost unintentionally comical in their absurdity. To a point, the film could be called intriguing purely to see where it is going. Kelly is occasionally clever in his ability to hold our attention through many of the films contrivances. In one scene Norma is teaching a class and then is asked by a strange boy about her foot. He taunts her about it as she is missing four of her toes. Later, at a rehearsal dinner for a wedding that Norma and Arthur are attending, this same student appears as a waiter and seems to be stalking them. Yet the eventual justification for these all of these oddities is wrapped up in a highly contrived sci-fi revelation that many will find implausible and difficult to swallow.

What is most disappointing about the film is that once the button is pressed surprisingly early on, many of the moral implications that were initially promised are diminished for much of pictures duration. The ending, which won't be spoilt here, resurfaces these moral questions again in the hope of echoing that of a Greek tragedy. While the resemblances can be seen, by this point, given the unlikelihood of so much of the film and the uneven performances, there is little reason to care. Cameron Diaz's Southern accent might be unnecessary but it is surprisingly Langella who is the most disappointing in the film, with a very unsubtly written role, as the mysterious scarred man, who seems to be hiding a military base that would make Dr. Evil proud. It really is just a shadow of his towering performance in Frost/Nixon. There is not a lot for many of the other actors in the film to do; in particular both Norma and Arthur could not be regarded as characters but mouthpieces for Kelly's pastiche of ideas. Underdeveloped and brief conversations, such as where Norma sympathises with Arlington over their deformities and also when Norma and Arthur question whether they really know each other in case the button kills either of them, highlights this.

Since 2001, Richard Kelly has failed to make a film that has lived up to the quality and the imagination of Donnie Darko. Though this film might be intriguing for a little while, it is too absurd and implausible to be fully enjoyed and it would certainly not warrant multiple viewings given the film's rather illogical revelations. Science fiction fans might be able to appreciate it somewhat more and draw their own conclusions, but what Kelly is really trying to say beneath the surface remains cryptic. The Box is one film this year that should have been shelved.

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44 out of 77 people found the following comment useful :-
Like it, or like it not, the truth behind the Box, 17 September 2009

Author: nikron from Sweden

This film just opened a film festival in Lund, Sweden, weeks before the official release. Although the film didn't make a massive impression on me, I definitely found it worthwhile.

It is a film that makes you think. The pace is slow, scary at times and gradually building a mood of mystery. Although confusing in the beginning, there is an explanation to it, like it or like it not. Satisfying to some, adding to the feeling of mystery to others.

It would be interesting to see the original short film the plot is based upon, in particular to see how the message could be delivered in a more condensed manner.

James and Frank were convincing, although Cameron doesn't quite deliver, perhaps not her genre.

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38 out of 69 people found the following comment useful :-
Two hours of your life you won't get back., 3 November 2009

Author: micall21 from Australia

This movie is really pretty empty. A mildly intriguing premise is never fully developed. It feels like someone got excited about a one-line idea and went straight into production before the script had a chance to take shape. Payoffs are few and far between. The script is as clunky as a supermarket trolley. The sub plots are deadends. And the cast... well, poor ol' Cameron tried hard but she didn't have much material to work with. And the extras? Wow - they really were something out of the box. They wouldn't have looked out of place in a late 1960's B-grade telemovie about the Village of the Feeble Minded (And Badly Acted) but in a full ticket price movie? Nahhh. They really dragged what little plausibility this movie had way down below the critical threshold of believability, and in some instances almost imposed an unwanted comedic tone into what should have been some serious moments (you'll see what I mean if you decide to see this film!). The Box is not worth seeing unless you are faced with a binary forced choice between this film and an anaesthetic-free dental appointment. It's weak. It's laboured. It's boring. And kinda' silly. Catch it on DVD when you can get it in a bundle of Weeklies for five bucks and then at least you can Eject it as soon as you realise it isn't going anywhere. Donnie Darko it 'aint.

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16 out of 26 people found the following comment useful :-
'The Box' should be marked 'return to sender', 8 November 2009

Author: jackcalvert from United States

*** This comment may contain spoilers ***

Set in 1976 for no apparent reason other than to keep the set dressers busy, 'The Box' was directed by Richard Kelly ('Donnie Darko'), and stars Cameron Diaz and James Marsden as Norma and Arthur Lewis, a young couple who are supposedly struggling financially even though they both have successful careers--she as a high school teacher, he as an optical specialist at NASA's Langley, Virginia, Research Center. They have one child, Walter (Sam Oz Stone).

One day the Lewises find a parcel on their doorstep, containing a black box with a big red button. There is a note from a 'Mr. Steward' indicating that he will return at 5:00 PM to explain about the box.

The mysterious Arlington Steward, played by Frank Langella, shows up at the appointed time, nattily attired in an elegant Savile Row suit. He is polite but businesslike, however his most noticeable feature is his face, half of which appears to have been blown off and improperly attended to. Langella is the only thing worth watching in the movie, however he is unfortunately upstaged by his own makeup, which resembles that of Harvey 'Two Face' Dent (Aaron Eckhart) from Christopher Nolan's 'The Dark Knight.' It's like the elephant in the room: one can try to ignore it, but it's more than a little distracting.

Steward explains that he will return in 24 hours to collect the button. If, during that time, they decide to unlock and push the button, he will give them $1 million cash. The only catch--and it's a big one--is that somewhere a stranger will die. It might be across town, it might be on another continent, however Steward assures them the victim will be someone unknown to them. As a show of good faith, he leaves them with a crisp $100 bill, theirs to keep whether they push the button or not.

Arthur and Norma are skeptical, believing the whole thing to be a scam or an elaborate hoax, however it isn't long before they begin to wonder what would happen if they did push the button? Would they really get a million dollars? Would somebody really die? Weary of the speculation, Norma slaps the button. Nothing happens. However, their initial relief gives way to alarm when Steward shows up the next day with a briefcase full of cash. They decide to call the whole thing off, however Steward tells them it's too late. "You've already pushed the button," he explains. As Steward's limo pulls away, Arthur notes the license number, which he later discovers is registered to the NSA (National Security Agency).

At this point the film begins to veer deeply into unfollowable territory as the secondary characters start springing nosebleeds and flashing peace signs. Meanwhile, the town becomes invaded by pudgy, slack-jawed geeks in bad shirts who start following Arthur around like an advance scouting party for a race of zombie alien nerds. Arthur eventually becomes trapped by the menacing bookworms in the library (?), where Steward's spinsterish wife shows up--whom we haven't seen till now--and informs Arthur that in order to get out of the library he must step into one of three vertical columns of cheesy-looking digital water effects. 'What happens if I choose the wrong one?', Arthur asks, seeming far less baffled than he ought to be under the circumstances, and certainly far less baffled than the audience is by this time. 'Eternal damnation,' the spinster says ominously.

Arthur steps into the middle column of digital liquid effects, and after a brief absence suddenly appears, still in his water cocoon, hovering over Norma's bed. When she wakes up and sees him, the water bubble bursts and Arthur tumbles onto the bed in a shower of water which, oddly enough, continues to drip from the overhead water pipes just out of camera range while a sodden Marsden and Diaz flop around on the bed.

It's confusing, I know.

We eventually learn that Steward was once the public relations officer for the NSA, until he was struck by a lightning bolt that destroyed part of his face. He was pronounced dead, but later came back to life, having been transformed into a sort of superman who now serves 'the ones who make the lightning,' and whose powers have enabled him to take over the CIA, the NSA, and NASA all by himself.

And what is the point of all this nattering rubbish? Apparently, Steward's mission is to subject humans to a kind of biblical character test (e.g., the 'Binding of Isaac'), to determine whether humanity is worth saving. If enough people pass the button test by refusing to push it, Steward's god-like overlords will spare the race. Unfortunately, those people who do push the button, such as Norma and Arthur, must be punished for their moral spinelessness, to which end they are subjected to a series of dreary 'Lady or the Tiger' ordeals that play out like one of those 'Saw movies,' except without the entertaining gore or the benefit of a coherent plot.

'The Box' represents the sort of pointless mental masturbation that freshman philosophy students like to blather on about after a few beers. Richard Kelly's tedious exercise in existentialist pettifoggery eventually collapses under the weight of its own incomprehensibility; the tortured melange of insupportable ideas eventually congeals, as with the mixing together of too many colors, into a meandering gray goo of a film as insipid as one of those narcotizing in-flight movies the plot of which suffers no more or less from having been interrupted by a leisurely nap.

There is a point in 'The Box' where Arthur, who is a technically-minded guy, becomes curious about how the button works. Opening up the unit, he is disappointed to find nothing inside.

Having seen The Box, I know exactly how he feels.

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9 out of 14 people found the following comment useful :-
How much would you sell your conscious for?, 9 November 2009

Author: brownah18 from United States

*** This comment may contain spoilers ***

In this movie the Box set in 1976 James Marsden plays (Aurthur Lewis) who is a NASA Engineer and his wife Cameron Diaz (Norma Lewis) who is a teacher in the suburb of Virginia. When a box with a button shows up at their doorstep with the instructions that Arlington Steward will show up the next day. Frank Langella (Alington Steward) shows up at the Lewis's door portraying a badly scared face. When invited inside by Norma he gives her the proposition that if you push the button two things will happen. Number one someone don't know will die and number two you will receive one million dollars. Giving her twenty-four hours to decide telling her she is to tell no one of this meeting and that he is not a liberty to give any details of his job. Seeming to be a hoax after telling Aurthur they both decide to push the button when they figure out the money is real. Steward returns with the money and taking the box with a key he leaves and after doing so Aurthur says he no longer wants the money and tries to give it back to Mr. Steward. Unable to give it back, Aurthur starts to investigate Steward and figure out who he is and who he works for. Bad comes to worse and the wormhole of just a simple proposition goes awry. In a sense like Chris Hewitt of the St. Paul Pioneer Press this movie has a M. Night Shyamalan feel to it. Steward controlling other people through someone else controlling him makes you wonder who is running this job really. In a big part, is the box used to invoke havoc or just ruin your family. Almost everyone is in on helping Steward partake in his job, so can he really be stopped. This movie will have you still contemplating what really happened throughout the movie. Thrilling and gripping at your seat this movie will keep you intrigued until the very end.

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9 out of 14 people found the following comment useful :-
If I didn't see Dogville and Donnie Darko before......, 7 November 2009

Author: honorhorror from China

*** This comment may contain spoilers ***

The Box is pretty much summed up as the combination of the two movies. The compelling performances by all the leading actors made it work, but it's essentially not a breakthrough.

Though, The Box really had some good qualities. In terms of building the suspense and putting characters in horrific, jeopardy circumstances The Box again showed the talent of Richard Kelly. The brooding, harsh visual style alone can keep you entertained for the whole 110 minutes, so don't listen to those negative comments about it's boring.

The story itself can be summarized as a twisted interpretation of Old Testament in the Bible, aka, trials and errors. You already know the ending when you see the beginning, but it's the process that kept you guessing and hoping for the best to happen. It's morally terrifying but it's also functional in delivering the messages.

The story alone is not Kelly's talent, rather it's the narration and the full cast in control. With enough big names like Frank Langella, Cameron Diaz and James Marsden, Kelly's still able to pull off some great dramatic moments with those aging beautiful faces. There are a lot of weird things that look and sound fun in the movie, from Frank Langella's face to those 1970's visionary sci-fi fantasies. One need to realize this movie is not intended for competition with Avatar but rather a homage to the style of Incredibles in terms of production design and so.

The worst thing about the movie, might be that it occasionally took itself too serious. Sometimes the characters are so straight-minded that you cry out for them outside the big screen. Anyway, in terms of subtlety and depth The Box is no match for Dogville, which in my opinion is among the best moral thrillers.

7/10 basically palatable.

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10 out of 17 people found the following comment useful :-
you have no idea what to expect..., 6 November 2009

Author: rivertam26 from United States

The creator of Donnie Darko brings you a twilight zone themed tale of the oddest fashion. The film centers on a middle aged young couple living paycheck to paycheck in 1976. One day a mysterious box appears with a red button. Later on that day a spooky gentleman shows up and tells them that they have the choice to press the button and receive a million dollars but someone they don't know will die. It's a disturbing and provocative question suspensefully outlined in the trailer and TV spots. But let it be known that you just don't know what your in for until you see it. At times pretentious and a bit melodramatic the film is ultimately effective because of it's good performances and intriguing subject matter. It would be unfair to ruin any of the plot twists for you but lets just say the film will deliver on the aspects you expect it to and not completely fulfill others it begins to outline. There's a lot of apparent symbolism and subtext in the film which is both interesting and annoying as it wasn't so evident in his other superior film Donnie Darko. There isn't too much more to say without ruining the film for you. it's meant to inspire lots of cafe chatter afterwards. However, i'd also like to say It's shot well and has an appropriately aged look to it and it's worth a watch. Check it out.

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3 out of 4 people found the following comment useful :-
A Big Box of Swiss Cheese, 13 November 2009

Author: theparanoid from United States

The showing of 2012 was sold out tonight so my girlfriend and I decided to take in a whole other kind of disaster, The Box. The preview made it appear intriguing and suspenseful, but our experience was little but confusing and disappointing.

The concept was interesting for a little while, but there are just way too many holes in this box on the way to the preposterous yet predictable ending. You're left wondering if you dozed off at a crucial time and missed the explanation that would make sense of it all. You will hear couples around you talking throughout most of the movie, each hoping the other could explain something that the movie did not.

I was surprised there were so few seats filled on a Friday night for a movie that had been out for only a week. Word must have spread quickly to avoid this one, but we didn't get that message. Fortunately there were enough technical issues with the screening that we were able to get our money back. May you be so blessed if you also find yourself trapped in The Box.

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6 out of 10 people found the following comment useful :-
Should have been named "The Neverending Story"!..., 11 November 2009

Author: jcdugger from United States

*** This comment may contain spoilers ***

Before you dismiss my post as "not getting it", let me say...I'm one of the biggest Richard Kelly and "The Twilight Zone" fans out there. Donnie Darko is one my all-time favorites and I even thought Southland Tales had it's moments. I'm a HUGE sci-fi fan. I was very excited to see "The Box", couldn't wait for it to come out.

Having said that..."The Box" is terrible. Behind "Drag Me To Hell", this was the worst movie I've seen in 2009. And it just simply WILL NOT end! Whenever you think you've reached the end, another change in the plot and you're off to more torture. I was actually groaning in the theater by the end of the film...I could hardly take it anymore.

The biggest problem with "The Box", no matter how you slice it or try to justify it, is that it simply makes little sense. Trust me, I "got it", I understood what was going on. But that doesn't mean it makes a lot of sense looking back on it. Take the basics for example. The main couple...Cameron Diaz and James Marsden, playing Norma and Arthur Lewis. Diaz loses her finances at her job, then bemoans to her husband that they are "living paycheck to paycheck". Well, sell that f-ing Porsche your husband is driving then!!! They live in a beautiful 2-story house in a nice subdivision. Marsden is working what seems to be a high-paid job at NASA and Diaz is an accomplished teacher. And, yes, Marsden drives an overly expensive car. But they are somehow living paycheck to paycheck?!? No need to press the button, just cut down your high-priced lifestyle a bit! The movie would have worked better if they showed the couple jobless and in serious debt. Instead, they are seemingly desperate for money...all the while living what I would call a luxurious lifestyle. Like I said...you can understand what's going on, yet it still makes little sense! That's a rare combination.

There was a scene in a library that I feel will go down as one of the worst segments of all-time. It was idiotic, illogical and out of place. I can't even begin to fully explain the eye-rolling that was going on in my head. So I will move onto a subplot that involves nose-bleeds and body possession by aliens. (Yes, I'm being serious). A kid is in Diaz's class with a wicked smile on his face. He starts asking Diaz personal questions, literally embarrassing her. No punishment is given to the kid whatsoever...he didn't even get asked to stay after class for a talk! Then Diaz is at a party...and the kid is one of the bus-boys! I don't know many alien-possessed kids that appear to be in Junior High who also moonlights as a bus-boy at parties attended by teachers and school officials...but we found one here! (See what I mean...you can understand it completely, but it still makes no sense...a rare combo!) Like many things in the movie, the kid comes and goes...no explanation about him, no ending to his character. Then a lady approaches Diaz in a grocery store, telling her that experiments are being ran secretly and her family is one of the test subjects. Well...hmmm...if aliens have the ability to possess powers that can take over your body...and the aliens don't want to help Diaz...then who was taking over this lady's body and giving Diaz advice?! The lady was trying to help Diaz...while the aliens weren't interested in helping Diaz...so who the hell was controlling her body?! Never explained. Never talked about again. No nothing!! It goes on and on and on like this for, what seemed to me like, 2 weeks. It would not end! I wonder if this movie underwent a massive re-shoot at some point. It was poorly edited. Diaz's accent was there one minute, gone the next. Sub-plots began but never ended. The numerous push-backs of the release date obviously shows the problems the producers had with the finished product. It's truly a train-wreck.

Pass on this one...there's no redeeming value in it whatsoever. 3 out of 10, just because I like Diaz and sci-fi! But it probably deserves a 1 out of 10.

Thanks for reading! JD

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