Background: I was intrigued by The Box from the first time I heard of it. Of course, a large part of that interest was due to James Marsden’s presence in the film. (I’ve previously mentioned how much I enjoy him!) I wasn’t interested enough to go to the theater, but I intended to rent it one day. I never did. Last Christmas, one of my students let me borrow it to watch while my sister was home. We didn’t watch it then, so I kept it, intending to watch it. Finally, tonight, I put it in. I guess it’s mine now, as Janet didn’t really want it back, and she’s now in college.
Plot: Arthur & Norma Lewis (Marsden and Diaz) are struggling to make ends meet. Arthur, a NASA engineer, has just been rejected for astronaut training. Norma, a teacher at a private school, has just learned her faculty tuition discount is about to end, so their son will have to change schools. One morning, a mysterious box shows up on their doorstep. That evening, a strange, disfigured man arrives with a proposal: push the button on the top of the box and receive a $1,000 payment. The catch? The instant the button is pushed, someone the Lewis’s don’t know will die. Norma does push the button, launching the family on a strange, convoluted journey that culminates in Norma’s own murder.
Reactions: First off, Cameron Diaz’s southern accent isn’t great. It’s too southern—as if they live in the deep south, not Virginia. But with a great movie, I’d be able to easily get past the accent; unfortunately, The Box is not a great movie! It tries to be suspenseful and scary (and the music really wants you to be scared), but it just ends up being boring. I would have enjoyed it much more as a 30 or 60 minute episode of The Twilight Zone or The Outer Limits than I did as a full-length film, and I had to watch it in three installments, as I just couldn’t force myself to keep going. If I hadn’t been watching it for my blog, I never would have finished it. And aliens? Really? That was the explanation the filmmakers came up with? Also, what does it say about the writer’s view of women that each person who pushed the button was a woman?
Verdict: Get rid of (send back to Janet, even if she doesn’t want it!)
