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Rating: Country: USA Release Date: November 6, 2009 Distributor: Warner Bros Pictures Director: · Richard Kelly Cast: · Cameron Diaz · James Marsden · Frank Langella Related Sites: · Official site · IMDb: The Box Grade: C-

There's an old joke about how many surrealists it takes to screw in a light bulb. Answers vary widely but one of my favorites is 'Two. One to hold the giraffe and one to fill the bathtub with brightly colored machine tools. I couldn't stop thinking about that joke during "The Box." Not since Twin Peaks has anyone melded the real with the surreal in such a jarring fashion.

Based on the short story "Button Button" by Richard Matheson, the movie features Cameron Diaz as Norma, a school teacher with a good heart and a deformed foot. James Marsden plays her husband Arthur, a NASA grunt who dreams of going into space. One particularly bad day, when both Norma and James receive distressing news at work, a mysterious box appears on their porch. The owner of the box, Mr. Steward (Frank Langella), pays Norma a visit that evening to explain things. It's simple, really. If she presses the button she gets a million dollars, but somewhere in the world, someone she doesn't know will die. They have twenty-four hours to decide. From that point on, everything gets a little hazy.

It must be difficult for Richard Kelly, because everything he does is inevitably compared to "Donnie Darko." The genesis of something as delicious and twisted as "Donnie" must have required a certain 'perfect storm' of creativity, genius, and luck. In trying to recreate that magic, I don't know if Kelly spun an idea wheel, ingested some high-grade pharmaceuticals or what, but it didn't work. Watching "The Box" is like trying to assemble a jigsaw puzzle after a dog chewed up half of the pieces. At one point a character says "Frontal lobe bleeds...it's the weakness." Unfortunately, this film has bigger problems.

In all fairness though, I'd still rather sit slack-jawed in incredulity at something like "The Box" than have my heartstrings tugged by some sappy rom-com, much the same way I'd rather listen to the ravings of a schizophrenic than make banal chit-chat with strangers. Bizarre is usually interesting and this film is definitely bizarre. Others might find this worth a watch just for its commentary on the human condition, which is depressing, but probably spot on.