Don't Look For A Reason... Look For A Way Out
Rating: 6/10
Running Time: 90 minutes
US Certificate: R UK Certificate: 15
On DVD
Seven cliched characters – including a mathematician (de Boer), cop (Wint), psychologist (Guadagni), escape artist (Robson) and depressed nihilist (Hewlett) – wake up seeminlgy trapped in a giant hi-tech cube that’s filled with booby traps. The group have to work together to try and find a way out but they are faced with the unsurmountable problem that they are a total bunch of unlikeable boobs.
In it’s time (I can’t believe I am referring to the late Nineties as that), Cube was very intriguing and original as one of the first ‘how the hell did we get here’ mystery thrillers. A lack of explanation rightly focuses more of the attention on the characters and their predicament as the hows and whys are not important and would only get in the way. This pioneer paved the way for the fairly similar Saw franchise that took this idea and applied a sick and twisted aspect to it, which judging from its success, would suggest that our society prefers the gruesome approach. Cube has found it’s way into the hearts of geeks everywhere and claimed a cult status that probably isn’t deserved.
The entertainment factor of Cube allows you to partially see past the awful dialogue between horrific people you want to die from the off. It seems like the Director oberved rutting stags on the Discovery Channel and decided to use these confrontational animals to base nearly all the movie’s human interaction on – constant unsubtle conflict and poor quality insults. The twists and turns and random character death roulette late on in the movie save a plot that looked so linear and obvious in the early stages and consequently the film from being totally forgettable.
DVD Extras Director and cast audio commentary, bland interview with de Boer, three deleted scenes, trailers for this and Cube 2 and conceptual artwork and storyboards - not too scintillating apart from the commentary DVD Extras Rating: 5/10
Summary
If you can see past the awful dialogue, horrifically cliched characters and terrible writing, you might just be entertained enough to enjoy this cult sc-fi precursor to Saw.