Review of Cube 2: Hypercube (2002) by Andre P — 12 Nov 2008

Prettymuch a re-telling of the origional while managing to completely miss the point. Cube wasnt about the Cube, it was about the people in the cube, and while the question 'what is the cube, who made it, why are we here?' was ever-present, ultimately the movie was ABOUT what people did in that situation. Hypercube spends almost the whole movie searching for the meaning behind the cube, and comes up with far too many answers to these questions that served the first film so well unanswered. Cube happens devoid of context, devoid of backstory- the characters have histories but the outside world is not explored, it could be almost any time or place, its all about what happens inside this strange, enclosed space. Hypercube weaves a story of characters connected to a megacorporation who made the cube, of shady histories and unforseen links- a story that is ultimately dull and holds no sense of mystery.

The 'twists' feel unconvincing (SPOILER: How is a blind girl the most dangerous hacker on the planet?) and the last one is just tacked-on and unsatisfying.

While some of the playing with concepts of time and space is a little 'fun' (though the physics isnt anywhere near accurate, its like quantum means 'magic'), the movie distracts itself on exploring these ideas rather than the characters. SPOILER: The only interesting idea of the whole film is a man surviving inside the cube through cannabalizing quantum echos of the same people over and over and over again, though his psychosis is present before the start of the film, so you dont get a feeling of a progression towards madness due to the stress and foreignness of the enviroment. Not an exploration of madness, just an expression of it.

In its own context the movie is not good but not horrible, as a sequel to cube, it is a misplaced exploitation of a franchise.