The Box

Richard Kelly extends his Darko mythos with The Box. It started with Donnie Darko and was followed by Southland Tales.

A man delivers a box with a button inside. He visits the mom and says ...

If you push the button, two things will happen. First, someone somewhere in the world whom you don't know, will die. Second, you will receive a payment of one million dollars. You have 24 hours.

You can watch the YouTube HD Trailer here. There are several scenes in the trailer that are not in the movie. Expect the DVD "The Box:Director's Cut" with those missing scenes! The picture to the left was not in the movie and seems to be part of a part in the movie where the mom and dad infiltrate the NASA building to learn its secrets.

At first I wasn't going to see The Box because there's too many movies involving super-natural forces out now including Paranormal Activity, The Fourth Kind, The Men Who Stare at Goats, A Christmas Carol and The Twilight Saga:New Moon but then I learned Richard Kelly directed and helped write the screen play. I loved Donnie Darko and Southland Tales and I also loved The Box. I also can't wait to see what Richard Kelly has in store for us in the future.

The movie goes way beyond what it shown in the trailer. Their decision of whether to push the button or not will affect all of mankind, not just one person. The right thing to do, of course, is not to push the button. It's wrong to kill someone, even for one million dollars. But we all have our price ... a level of reward we'll accept to do something against our ethics and morals. If most of us humans would push the button, do we deserve to live as a race?

The visuals and special effects are often reminiscent of Donnie Darko. In fact, there are visuals that are taken directly from Donnie Darko linking them into the same universe. This movie occurs in the 1970s so you can think of it as a prequel to Donnie Darko.

One good point the movie makes is from a quote from Arthur C. Clarke, "Profiles of The Future", 1961 (Clarke's third law) where he says "Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic. " This is especially true in this movie. I'd like to think that it is 100% science fiction with no super natural element and yet I've read descriptions that say it has super natural elements in it. I think they are confusing magic with advanced technology.