The Box
DVD | Blu-ray
Directed by Richard Kelly
Starring Cameron Diaz, James Marsden, Frank Langella, Sam Oz Stone, James Rebhorn
Warner Home Video
Release Date: February 23, 2010

Your home is a box. Your car is a box on wheels. You drive to work in it. You drive home in it. You sit in your home, staring into a box. It erodes your soul, while the box that is your body inevitably withers… then dies. Where upon it is placed in the ultimate box, to slowly decompose.

Place yourself in this situation for just a moment: a mysterious man with a disfigured face and friendly demeanor shows up at your doorstep. The man has but a very simple offer for you: there’s a box with a button on it; push the button once, and you will receive one million dollars in cash and tax-free. The only trade-off is that if you accept this offer, someone somewhere on the planet that you do not know will somehow die. It could be a child; it could be a serial killer.

Do you push the button?

Before even beginning The Box, I pondered this question many times over. It could perhaps be the perfect psychological question to ask, and I doubt anyone could truthfully answer it unless the choice was sitting in front of their eyes, waiting for a decision to be made. It seems to me that simply too much is on the line to make that kind of choice, but when certain people are in certain situations in life… consciences can vary greatly.

“You wake up one morning and say “World, I know you! From now on there are no more surprises!’.” — Jill McBain from Once Upon A Time In The West

“The barbarities of war are seldom committed by abnormal men. The tragedy of war is that these horrors are committed by normal men in abnormal situations.” — Major J.F Thomas from “˜Breaker’ Morant

“See that bird? That’s the spirit bird. He will always look after you.” — Maud from Rabbit-Proof Fence

Every weekend we pay to see the fruits of the filmmakers’ dreams at the multiplex. Every weekend translates into a cynical game of Russian roulette with our cash. Every weekend there is a chance to fall under their spells and believe all over again. Every weekend there is a chance to truly escape reality for a few hours. Their self-indulgence is a double-edged sword which can either transcend their final vision into unlimited ecstasy or send it crashing to the eternal damnation of the bargain DVD bin at the local Best Buy. Certain films still have a hypnotic power over me, but there are a few that punch me in the gut and send me into another dimension. Werner Herzog knows all too well about the joy and “burden of dreams.”