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"...a collision of disparate styles which shouldn’t work but, strangely, does."

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"...the lacklustre performances and uninspiring script fail to engage viewers of any age."

The Girl Who Kicked The Hornet's Nest: The Extended Cut

"...this final chapter remains almost deliberately over-talky, uneventful and drab..."

Ben Hur

"..a 4 hour melodramatic spectacle, but it’s still wonderful to watch."

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The Box (DVD)

by Julian Shaw | March 12, 2010 09:33 | Edited March 12, 2010 09:57

Despite a poor premise, this film is an intriguing affair abound with strange details

Working from Richard Matheson's 1970 short story, director Richard Kelly (Donnie Darko) has produced a moody and visually intoxicating effort with The Box, which follows the fantastical fall from grace of Norma (Cameron Diaz) and Arthur Lewis (James Marsden), who are offered one million dollars by a mysterious stranger (Frank Langella) just to push a button located atop a wooden box. As a consequence of their actions, however, an unknown person will die.

 

The Box abounds with strange, tangential details: Cameron Diaz' character has four missing toes, and Marsden is set on building a prosthesis that will allow her to walk without a limp. While odd, it makes sense when you learn that Kelly has attempted to graft the story of his parents' lives onto the plot. Diaz' foot injury is based on his mother, while Kelly's dad was famously a NASA man. Fleshing out Matheson's slim framework with his own family's experiences is an interesting touch, but Kelly is slightly hobbled by a premise unable to hold up for more than half an hour. That said, it's an intriguing affair, while a host of extras (including a commentary and featurette that play up Kelly's use of his own family history) sheds a fair amount of interesting light on proceedings.