Review of The Box (2009) by Nobodyyouknow — 24 Nov 2019
Interesting idea that is weighed down by leaden direction and acting. The first 30 minutes were just bad -- the pregnant pauses during almost every exchange were painfully awkward. And the nearly incessant use of overly dramatic music throughout the movie was distracting rather than supportive.
I love metaphorical movies, but the metaphor here was just too heavy-handed. Yes, people are selfish and humanity kinda sucks. So, what was that point of showing how empathetic Diaz's character was (to Langella's character) after she had already pushed the button? And then make her pay anyway? I've read more sci-fi short stories than I can recall, so I'm probably jaded, but the idea of aliens judging humanity is a tired device. And Langella's scene of expository dialog around the 1:10 mark was just plain preachy and really detracted from the story. If you're going to go to all the trouble Richard Kelly did to create rather detailed metaphor, don't ruin it with preachy expository dialog.
That said, it was unpredictable enough to keep me watching till the end, but worth viewing only if you have nothing better to do.
This review of The Box (2009) was written by Nobodyyouknow on 24 Nov 2019.
The Box has generally received mixed reviews.
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