The Box (2009)

[BTM]

So, I just saw and ad for this... basically a married couple receives a wooden box, and they're told if they open it, they'll get a million dollars but someone they don't know will die. 

That's apparently the entire film.

Er... wait a sec, wasn't that an episode of the Twilight Zone?  How the hell do you stretch a (I presume) half hour show with a simple plot like that into an entire film?

Ahh, I think I'll just go to moviepooper.com for this one...

[3mnkids]

I think the plot is stupid. This is not on my watch list     From what I could gather from the trailers they take the money and bad crap happens.. uh huh, its called karma. 

[InformationGeek]

Er... wait a sec, wasn't that an episode of the Twilight Zone?  How the hell do you stretch a (I presume) half hour show with a simple plot like that into an entire film?

Actually, the movie and that episode are actually based off of a short story called Button, Button by Richard Matheson.  I heard that Matheson didn't like how the Twilight Zone episode was, so maybe this movie might fit closer to how his short story turned out.

I like the idea behind the movie and I think it can turn out to be pretty interesting.

[Jack]

The commercial left me with the impression that the person who was going to die was someone close to them?  If so, that would be incredibly lame.

[Jim H]

The commercial left me with the impression that the person who was going to die was someone close to them?  If so, that would be incredibly lame.

No.  It's someone they don't know and have never met, made explicit in the trailers I believe.  My presumption was the box would pass on, and if they had pushed the button, for the next person to get the box, the "someone they don't know" would be the previous button pusher. 

I haven't read the story or seen the movie, just making a guess.  Since it's Matheson, it's probably a good short story that shouldn't have been stretched to feature length.

[Monster Jungle X-Ray]

The commercial left me with the impression that the person who was going to die was someone close to them?  If so, that would be incredibly lame.

No.  It's someone they don't know and have never met, made explicit in the trailers I believe.  My presumption was the box would pass on, and if they had pushed the button, for the next person to get the box, the "someone they don't know" would be the previous button pusher. 

I haven't read the story or seen the movie, just making a guess.  Since it's Matheson, it's probably a good short story that shouldn't have been stretched to feature length.

I am thinking the same thing Jim, that would give it a sort of ironic twist as they would have to avoid being killed for the rest of the movie by whomever pushed it after them. Something about it reminds me of The Game with Michael Douglas. It is also directed by Richard Kelly who did Donnie Darko so it might have something to it.

[WilliamWeird1313]

I love Matheson. That said, I always thought "Button, Button" was just one of his "okay" stories. That said, I saw the movie with low expectations, and even those were let down. I had high hopes but low expectations. High hopes because, as I said, I love Matheson, and I really wanted this to be a good movie. Low expectations because of the "talent" involved (Cameron Diaz and her horribly forced, horrible fake accent made me want to gouge out my own eardrums with soldering irons) and the commercials made it look, well, like contrived, CGI-dependent, ridiculous stupidity. Which is exactly what it was. And then some. Even Frank Langella couldn't save this burning wreck. Hopelessly muddled and indulgent in all the wrong ways. The movie feels like it simply refuses to end, and seems to drag on forever, despite the fact that it has a generally typical runtime. It's from the guy who directed Donnie Darko and Southland Tales, so it's no surprise that he shoved as much meaningless, pretentious nonsense into this thing as possible. It felt like somebody took a script for a movie, then grabbed another script for a very, very different movie, then forced the two to comingle into one. Hopelessly bungled in every way. AVOID!!!

Matheson weeps.

[Skull]

So, I just saw and ad for this... basically a married couple receives a wooden box, and they're told if they open it, they'll get a million dollars but someone they don't know will die. 

That's apparently the entire film.

Er... wait a sec, wasn't that an episode of the Twilight Zone?  How the hell do you stretch a (I presume) half hour show with a simple plot like that into an entire film?

Ahh, I think I'll just go to moviepooper.com for this one...

hehe it depends on the length of the short story... a script needs to be 120 pages long and its spaced so if you compress it into a book it'll look like 50 pages. :)


although, the subject matter of the story is too silly for me to watch or suspend reality...

First, a couple gets a wooden box and told if they open it they get a million dollars and somebody they DONT know will die... So they open it! (no connection to care)

On the otherhand, we are talking about a boring moral issue... So its like: Indecent Proposal... Zzzzzzzzzzzzz...

[Jim H]

Matheson weeps.

Does he?  Has he seen the film yet?  I haven't seen an interview or anything with him in ages.  I'd like to know what he thinks of the more recent adaptations of his works, like this film and I Am Legend.