Movie Review (sort of): The Box

The gist:

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. (Written by Warner Bros. Pictures)

 

Hello, there, young lady. Would you like to check out my button unit?

It's not that I don't like writing negative reviews.  Oh, hell yes, I do. It's just that I tend to write a lot of them. Does this mean that most movies are bad?  Sort of.

So, why did Richard Kelly's new riddle, The Box, which opens tonight, make me think of this?  I guess it's that with Kelly's films (Donnie Darko, Southland Tales) his presence is so obvious you can almost see him thinking through the next steps of his films, which is usually a bad thing.  But The Box is in "so bad it's actually good" territory.  With Kelly, weirdness turns to mystery and then back to just plain hollow oddity and back around to well-lit weirdness again with no clear drawn conclusions. His plot choices seem random and self-indulgent on top of just plain confusing or silly.  Even though The Box is his first foray into the blatantly commercial, it's a crazy-ass art movie and for that, Kelly gets mad props.  The crazy-ass artist in me that once made many terrible and personal short films loves that Kelly awkwardly jammed bits from his own childhood as well as those bizarre water-time-portal-tube-things from Donnie Darko into an already uber-wacko The Box.  I would just really like to get a beer with this dude.

Now if they don't press the button there would be no movie, which may be totally fine for some people.  Me, I'm pretty meh about it.

A movie like The Box, with its ripe for Twilight Zone premise (oh, wait) and totally inexplicable events, calls for a collection of random observations intended to amuse, rather than a formal review. A "real" review would end up sounding negative and I can't bring myself to tell people not to see The Box simply for the numerous X-Files-esque moments of nose-bleeds, floodlit air hangers, gateways to other realms, black town cars and the sneaky NSA operatives.  It's a rich tapestry of corny 1976 America recreations and laughable plot turns with a score so heavy it nearly crushes poor pretty boy James Marsden and Cameron "Are Those Cheeks Implants or Are You Just Happy to See Me?" Diaz.  Kelly's jaw-dropping audacity to commit some of this stuff to film...what else can I say?  This man has huge balls.

So here are some snippets that, collected together, might form a full picture of my thoughts on this marvelously problematic and heavy-handed film. (Spoiler-free. Don't worry some of stuff I could tell you, you wouldn't believe anyway.)

• Kelly really likes thunder sound effects.  Both Donnie Darko and the The Box have title sequences that begin with distant rumblings having little to do with their opening shots.  Couldn't check this out on Southland Tales. When I Googled "video of Southland Tales intro" - I totally got porn.

• If like 5 people get nosebleeds in front of you, you might want to consider that a sinister plot is being orchestrated around you because you totally pressed the button some half-faced dude paid you $1M to press to kill someone, yo.
  

• If you're ever making a movie and are not sure which shot to cut to next, just do a quick jump to the villain standing around in his Dr. Evil fortress then go back to the A plot line. You can do that like 3 times, it will look awesome and serves as awkward transitions that make people think you're trying to say something even though you have no idea where that section of the film is going.  Seriously.  Oh, and add some weird water tube effects in his lair of evil for good measure.
  

• Never trust kids that ask to see your disfigured foot in class. They either have an amputee fetish or they are part of a deeper conspiracy being orchestrated around you because you totally pressed...hmmm, I'm sensing a theme here.
  

• Cramming scientists, the Viking Lander, government conspiracy, disfigured people, zombie spies, a really cool old library, What's Happening!!, vintage coke cans, Sartre and Cameron Diaz into one movie yields the expected messy results, yet predicting what insane event is going to happen next is nearly impossible. Quirkier than you can possibly imagine.
  

• Even the most blow-hard overly acted melodramatic fake southern accent filled sci-fi abomination can get to you if a cute kid is in peril. It's actually called Spielberg's Law of Audience Manipulation. Yeah, I read that in a film journal somewhere.
  

• Google "altruism coefficient" for some light reading before viewing this film.
  

• If you're a fan of huge build-up that doesn't remotely deliver, you're gonna love The Box.  It's a tease, but the ride is so out there it's almost fun.
  

• And finally, numero uno lesson learned - if a stranger leaves a strange button in a box on your doorstep and offers you money to push said button...don't.  (Also, it might be the sick game of some aliens and shit, so steer clear.  Aliens are nut jobs, everyone knows that.)
  

***/*****
The Box earns three stars from me just for its moxie.


The Box
opens tonight

115 min
Writ./Dir.: Richard Kelly, based on the story Button, Button by Richard Matheson
Starring: James Marsden (X-Men), Cameron Diaz , Frank Langella (Frost/Nixon)
Rated PG-13 for language and disturbing images and it's just plain unsettling especially the aforementioned part with the kid.