THE BOX
US, 2009, 115 minutes, Colour.
Cameron Diaz, James Marsden, Frank Langella, James Rebhorn, Holmes Osborne, Sam Oz Stone, Gillian Jacobs, Celia Weston.
Directed by Richard Kelly.
Cameron Diaz, playing teacher, Norma, a mid-30s wife and mother who has a deformed foot because of a prolonged X-ray accident, and James Marsden, playing scientist, Arthur, who has applied to be an astronaut, are awakened early one morning to find a mysterious box at their front door. So, the film, The Box, begins – and ends with another couple opening and reacting to their box.
Based on a story by expert science fiction and Twilight Zone writer, Richard Matheson (I am Legend), Button, Button, this film has been written and directed by Richard Kelly (Donnie Darko, Southland Tales).
A visitor, Arlington Steward (Frank Langella with suave gravitas and dignified voice), explains the box – its power to kill a person, and a payment of $100,000,000, if Norma and Arthur push the button in the box. To this extent, the film serves as a moral fable about the temptation to money and security and about testing the moral fibre of a person who may be willing to press a button for gain and cause the death of an unknown and anonymous person.
However, the film is also a science fiction fable. Mr Steward (one side of whose face has been destroyed) has been struck by lightning and who seems to be possessed by the power of Martians – he was part of a team of the 1976 mission to Mars which brought back samples to earth.
As the film progresses, many individuals begin to speak in sinister manner and are afflicted by nose bleeds: an insolent boy in Norma's class, the school principal, a waiter at a wedding rehearsal dinner, Norma and Arthur's babysitter for their son, Walter. This seems another version of The Invasion of the Body Snatchers. What's more, the NASA and CIA authorities seem to be in on what seems more and more a conspiracy. In the meantime, there is a mysterious murder of the wife of one of Arthur's colleagues and the husband has disappeared. Norma's father is in charge of the investigation.
The Box becomes more and more Twilight Zone-like and Norma and Arthur are forced to make bizarre life and death choices. Actions and choices cannot be reversed and can have devastating consequences.
The tension builds quite slowly but, looking at some of the angry comments in the IMDb blog for the film, the plot seems to have been too complicated for many American viewers and they gave up – a worrying sign that impatient viewers show such a lack of capacity for comprehension.
1.The film as a thriller, science fiction, moral fable of values?
2.The 1976 setting, the Viking expedition to Mars, the reality, the fiction? The probe of the planet, messages, samples? The team, the photo? The achievement? Getting the material for the future of exploration? The initial Langley memo and the information about Arlington Steward?
3.The presuppositions about Martians, contact with Earth, the lightning strike and its hitting Steward? The Martians testing the humans, moral fibre, justice, punishment, eternity? The body- and mind-snatching?
4.The references to Jean- Paul Sartre? Norma and her teaching the class, her explanation about Hell, no exit, Hell as other people? Norma and Arthur going to see the play? Steward and his talking about the Sartre themes?
5.Richard Matheson, his imagination, the background in The Twilight Zone?
6.Recreating the period, homes and school, Langley and NASA? Parties and weddings? Motels? Libraries?
7.The screenplay going beyond reality and realism, the box, its power, Langley and the CIA and information, Steward’s huge laboratory, his experiments, the water blocks and their collapse?
8.Norma and Arthur at the beginning, waking, Walter, the box at the door, having breakfast, the note? Arthur going to Langley, the press conference, his comment about the lens and the cameras, his work, making the plaster cast for Norma’s foot, the letter about being an astronaut, his failing the psychological tests? Norma, with the boys, kissing Walter at the bus, in class, the boy and his taunting her about her foot, her showing her foot, the missing toes? The story about the radiation and the amputation? Her going to the principal, hearing that the discount for education was being withdrawn? The situation and finance?
9.Mr Steward, the significance of his name? The box, the explanation, the hundred dollars, the conditions, keeping it a secret, having twenty-four hours to decide? Talking with Arthur, their going to the play, Walter and Dana? The talk at the table and Norma impulsively pushing the button?
10.Mr Steward, his face and its destruction, Norma stating her compassion and love for his disability? His explanation of the box, the sense of gravitas, his return, bringing the money, Arthur not wanting to participate, taking the numberplate, asking his father-in-law to track it down?
11.The wedding rehearsal, joy, Norma’s parents, the plans for the wedding, the speeches, the gifts, Arthur taking the brown paper-wrapped box, the photo of Mr Steward within? Arthur verifying it? Norma, called to the phone, the mysterious behaviour of the waiter? Mr Steward warning her about the investigation? The boy from class, serving, taunting Arthur, the fight? Arthur and his taking Dana to the motel, her strange behaviour and the warning?
12.The people with bleeding noses, the principal, the boy, the waiter, Dana?
13.The police, the situation, the murder of the woman, her daughter being found, her husband on the run – and his later warning Arthur? Preparing the scenario for Norma’s death?
14.Langley, the personnel, the leadership, their sympathy for Arthur, the discussions about the letter? His friends, his work on the foot for Norma, the gift for her? Future jobs? The leadership, the information from the CIA, NASA, the leadership and their concurring?
15.The wedding, the dancing? Arthur being taken? Walter being taken? Norma going to the library, the video? Arthur and the library, Steward’s wife, the group whose minds were snatched, the test, the choice of the water, the glimpse of eternity? The collapse of the water in his own room? The family mopping it up? The mystery? Mr Steward saying he liked mystery?
16.The final confrontation with Mr Steward, Walter blind and locked in the bathroom, Arthur and his being asked to make the choice, Norma wanting her death rather than Walter to be blind and deaf? Her death, the police arriving, arresting Arthur? Walter free? The special squad taking Arthur and removing him?
17.Mr Steward, going to the next family, the wife pushing the button?
18.The plausibility and implausibility of the story?
19.The moral emphasis about ordinary people, money, security, the death of another person, pushing the button – and having to accept the consequences?
