Cube (1997) Dir: Vincenzo Natali
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Vincenzo Natali's 1997 science fiction horror is a bit of a mixed bag. For example, it has some genuinely great practical effects that stand up well, but also some truly dated and terrible visual effects that really take away from the experience of the film.
The premise, though only semi-unique, was relatively well utilised for the most part. I think the narrative did well to try and build arcs beyond the obvious 'escape' story. That said, I think that maybe some of these stories could have been executed better.
The twists worked nicely enough, the character development was decent and the pacing was just about alright - the only real problem I had was with one or two of the acting performances.
But I'll start more positively with the film's standout; David Hewlett. He felt the most believable, the most natural and, although this is writing not acting, he had the best character arc. His performance left him clearly head and shoulders above the others.
The other good display came from Nicole de Boer, who, a bit like Hewlett, seemed to get better as the film progressed. I think she came into her own a bit more in the final thirty minutes or so.
My least favourite performance was that of Maurice Dean Wint. He started off pretty brightly, but just got steadily worse and worse, until he was undeniably the worst part of the film.
The trio of Nicky Guadagni, Andrew Miller and Wayne Robson kind of fell somewhere in between for me. They weren't overly good or bad, but I think their characters, with the exception of Robson, were pretty poorly written.
Overall, this felt like a very 90s science fiction horror, and, despite its drawbacks, I found it to be a pretty interesting and enjoyable film. It didn't blow me away by any means, but I thought that it had some cool moments and some decent twists that helped it along.
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