Economy Size Geek

Cube (1997)

By now you’re probably begining to think that I stopped watching movies - that’s partially true. I’ve been stuck in the middle of a couple (which I absolutely hate) thanks in large part to three things.

1. The Spurs - they continue to win - I continue to watch. This eats into a lot of my tv time.
2. Seaon Finalie land - yes thanks to things like a 2hr finish for CSI I’m a little back logged
3. Hobby time - I’ve actually broken away from the tv to work on some hobby stuff.

Anyway enough about me - let’s talk about “Cube” - which I could have sworn was called “The Cube” which was annoying since IMDB didn’t show me the movie when I put the “The” in there but did when I didn’t.

This is apparantly in that “Cult Movie” status. Which is completely understandable. You’ve probably never heard of it where as I saw it for the first time about six years ago on Sci Fi channel. It’s haunted me a little ever since - and thanks to the joys of Netflix it came to darken my DVD player. For those of you who are gluttons for movie obscurity - there is both a sequel (Cube 2:Hybercube) and a prequel (Cube Zero). I haven’t seen either - and it is incredibly unlikely that I will based on the limited reading I did on IMDB.

Since you probably haven’t seen it - short summary is in order - People are trapped in these rooms. Some of safe and some are trapped with wires or flame throwers. People meet up and form a group to try and find a way to escape. The people are all complete strangers and they come from all walks of life. If you want to have fun place bets as soon as you are introduced to characters on who lives and who dies.

The easiest way to think about this film - is if they made Sci-Fi plays - this would be it :) The director does a great job of taking a 16′x16′x16′ space and making it seem infinite by some lame lighting changes and a lot of cutting in the editing room. Which believe me I totally approve of. One hint - a lot of people die.

For a sci-fi film the actors do a passable job of acting - this is actually pretty impressive when you consider that most of them didn’t go on to much of a career - exceptions being one ended up on The Dead Zone and the other on Stargate:Atlantis - which means they apparently liked the whole sci-fi thing.

The thing that makes this movie really great is that most of it is completely character driven. You slowly get to find out about their backgrounds and watch them crumble as they try to escape.

The thing that really stuck with me even from the first time I saw it was an argument the characters have about why they are in the Cube in the first place. None of them remember getting there. And they can’t think of why they are there. There is the theory of aliens, or the government or an evil genius.

Then Worth (one of the characters in the movie) has his theory - that there is no conspiracy. That the whole thing was built by people who were just doing their jobs - not thinking about what their part in all of it was. That there was no master planner. This is just something that happened. Something that started with one purpose or another and became the Cube. It would keep happening because to stop it would basically be admitting that it was wrong in the first place - and that would be a greater crime to a beauracy than the act of killing people.

You will have to see the film to know which answer the write chose. But the reason why this always stuck with me is because it fits with Occam’s Razor “when you have two competing theories which make exactly the same predictions, the one that is simpler is the better.” Which I find I tend to follow where possible. Worth’s explanation is extreme but it follows the pattern of a lot of oddities I see in the real world - it’s not that people set out to be evil - more that they made a choice and it had unintended consiquences that could be perceived as evil or malicious.

And driving in to work today I was listening to NPR talk about the Guantamino Bay detainees - and I realized that is a perfect example. Here are a bunch of people some who may be terrorists and some who were probably just in the wrong place at the wrong time who are being held in secret off the coast of the US. If the government had a great case against them you know that they would have brought them to trial, but to release them at this point would basically be admitting that they probably shouldn’t have held them in the first place. This is a perfect parallel to the idea Worth talks about.

So in the end - I still liked the movie even watching it a second time knowing how it was going to play out.

Bottom line: If you like sci-fi and can handle watching the same few characters for and hour and a half while you try to collect money based on the order they die - go ahead and check it out. If you prefer your sci with more space craft or lazer pistols look else where. If you want simple and unambiguoues - or you only have time for the oscar worthy drama - keep moving along.

p.s. Oh and I so called it that the writers were Canadian - who says “Free Clinic Doctor” and they just had to squeeze in a lot of french didn’t they :P