It’s a simple moral quandary. A mysterious package shows up at your door containing a box with a button on top and a note telling you that you will be visited by someone you don’t know. An equally mysterious man shows up later that day and makes you a simple offer: If you push the button on the box, someone you don’t know will die, but in return, you get one million, untaxed dollars. What do you do?
This is the exact predicament that Norma (Cameron Diaz) and Arthur Lewis (James Marsden) are faced with. Norma is a teacher and has recently been told that she will no longer get a deduction on her son Walter’s (Sam Oz Stone) tuition. Arthur works for NASA and recently designed a camera for the Rover sent to Mars. He has been rejected for astronaut training due to failing the psychological exam. They are living paycheck to paycheck when suddenly the box shows up on their doorstep. Later that day, Mr. Steward (Frank Langella), informs Norma of the offer, which she later tells to her husband. One of the stipulations of the offer gives them a mere 24 hours to think it over before the box is taken away, reprogrammed and given to someone else.
Whether or not the button is pushed will not be mentioned here, but this is merely the beginning of the story. The results of the box dilemma lead to a whole new series of events that seem to spiral out of control, leaving us in complete mystery as we try to piece them together. These events involve the National Security Agency, NASA, blanked-faced people everywhere, strange portals, and aliens.
You can see how this sounds like it might get completely out of hand, but writer/director Richard Kelly is not a stranger to these types of situations. For those of you familiar with his break-out hit, “Donnie Darko,” you know that his work can go in some incredibly bizarre directions before we reach the conclusion.
While “The Box” may not become the same kind of cult hit that “Darko” is, Kelly uses a lot of the same tone and mysterious subject matter to keep his viewers off-track. Most of act two of “The Box” may leave viewers frustrated as they wait for everything to be explained to them, but Kelly is not one to provide the easy answers that the audience looks for.
This film was on the fence between recommendation and non-recommendation until the third act rolled around, and while it doesn’t explain everything (most good science-fictions films don’t), it felt like it had answered enough to explain itself. In other words, once the movie comes full-circle, it’s easier to have more of an appreciation for it and what Kelly was trying to accomplish with the story. It ends up having a larger impact when the final pieces of the plot are revealed.
In this way, “The Box” reminded me of another film that leaves its payoff until the end, “Seven Pounds,” though they are completely different in tone and genre aside from the mystery element to it. That was another film that had me on the fence until the final act revealed what the purpose of everything had been, and therefore changing the meaning of what had seemed like a middle section that had been drowning in mystery.
Would the third act be nearly as strong if everything was laid out for us in the second act? It’s doubtful. As for those questions that go unanswered, the effect would not be the same if we knew the answers. What would there be to discuss regarding the film if we knew everything? One question it leaves us with is perhaps the most important question of all, one that was posed in the very first paragraph of this review and is one that the film cannot answer: What would you do given this opportunity?
3/4 stars.
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