Vincenzo Natali’s Cube, a masterpiece of the late 1990s, had a slow and strange release schedule. Like many other sci-fi and horror films of the 1990s, it went unnoticed in American theaters but developed a strong cult following due to repeated showings on The Sci-Fi Channel (now Syfy) and good sales through home media. It took quite some time for it to spread all over the world; however, when it did land internationally, it surpassed expectations.
More than any other film’s market, Japan was highly receptive to this movie about strangers stuck in a massive industrial cube full of deadly traps. “It did really well in Japan where people live with a sense of claustrophobia,” said Graeme Manson who co-wrote the script.
In some Japanese environments there is an efficiency tightness as evidenced by ‘box homes,’ ‘small space living,’ ‘work boxes’ and ‘capsule hotels’ that are quite common in its crowded urban cityscapes. No wonder then that the remake of Cube is Japanese. This time around Yasuhiko Shimizu (Vise), directs from Kôji Tokuo’s script and Akiko Funatsu (Ichi the Killer). However, while keeping some elements of existential dread and philosophical musings of Natali’s original movie, this film eventually becomes more positive or even sadder.
The newest Cube follows a group of people who wake up inside a large apparatus made up of multiple cubes not dissimilar to Rubik’s Cube like its predecessor did. These walls have doors which lead into another cube on every side though some contain deathly booby traps. Nobody understands why they are in this thing which can be called simply an entity or what its function might be let alone who constructed it or how they can leave it behind them? They could help one another; they could go solo; they can fight; they can stay in the same place forever. Or, it could be that nothing they do matters; maybe Cube imitates life and in life one does not die.
The new Cube occasionally goes all poetic on like this but generally, is less philosophical than the original film. It is mostly about how characters feels and think with arrays of emotions comprising masculinity (Suda, Masaki – who was really great in Wilderness: Part One and uses his soul-piercing eyes to bone-chilling effect), femininity (Watanabe, Anne) or passion (Okada, Masaki). He is the main focus of the film with Suda’s performance. In fact it sometimes looks as if the entire narrative exists just to re-enact his trauma.
He is haunted by what he did when his brother committed suicide and sometimes seems like other people are physical embodiments of these things and his guilt. This sets Shimizu’s version of Cube apart from Natali’s which avoided melodrama or sentimentality entirely so that its characters became representative for different philosophies existent or ways people make meaning out of life. Shimizu’s Cube becomes more emotional through highly expressive acting revealing sweeping sentimentality that brings out an ideological combat between fatalism and hope through poignant but histrionic means.
It is quite remarkable that Shimizu’s film just feels different. Cube is a very interesting movie to remake because at first, it looks like there can’t be any new ideas and fresh takes on it. This isn’t an evaluation, but rather one of the main distinctions of Cube—it is minimalist. In the entire film, almost everything has been stripped off; from plain and repetitive sets to identical clothes, from unknowable narratives to nameless ones. So remaking this may either give you exactly the same thing or something which is so far away from being Cube.
However, what has happened instead is a fascinating experiment in cultural difference. It gives people a chance to find out why Japanese cinema differs from other films by making a film with such minimalistic approach and keeping close to the original storyline for most of its running time. Its music, editing, direction and especially acting are different even if they tell the same story as its Canadian counterpart. The New Cube remains an excellent example of how cultural origins can define works of art or simulacra.
Whereas the 2023 Cube appears as light at the end of a tunnel after Late 90’s Cubes seemed more Gen X angst meets grim view towards future. That optimism can hardly be justified sociopolitically but makes for an interesting color change on time’s cinematic mood ring finger.
The biggest thematic motif in this film is a generational conflict between older boomers and younger Gen X-ers who have screwed up everything versus younger Millennials and Gen Zs who succumb into apathy, fatalism and hopelessness as if nothing mattered anymore – hence their slogan: “I don’t care”. At last it seems like there might be some hope for them to turn things around and make their world different and most importantly make themselves different too. Whether that destroys your willing suspension of disbelief and rings false depends upon your own level of cynicism about life.
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