Is the Question 'Why' Relevant in out Struggle for Survival?

Rating: 8/10 (29 June 2013)

To put it blunt this is a pretty good movie, though it is not one of those movies that you can watch multiple times. In a way it is like Buried in that the style of the movie and the ideas that it portrays are brilliant but it can also be so disturbing that you can really only watch it once. Mind you, I have seen this film three times now, and also own the DVD, but after watching it this third time I thought to myself that maybe I really cannot consider watching it again. Also, this film has spawned two sequels, though I am doubtful that the sequels will be anywhere near as good as the original, and the fact that Cube Zero actually answers a lot of the questions that the first film raises sort of destroys the mystery that the original movie creates.
Basically a group of people wake up in a cuboid room in a massive maze which is made up of other rooms, some of them trapped, others of them not. While questions are raise as to who made this thing and why they were placed there, these questions turn out to be meaningless simply because there is only one purpose here and that is to escape. I guess that is one of the ideas that comes out of this movie and that is that to many of us the philosophical questions really do not provide us with any real answers as we struggle to survive. In fact, one will note that those who tend to dwell on the philosophical questions are those that are financially free to enable them to pursue these goals. Many of the writers and philosophers in the past all came from rich and affluent societies, and even today the bulk of the working class simply do not care about the answer to 'why' but are only interested in their next paycheque.
Then there is the idea of the prison. One thing that I discovered is that each of the characters are named after a famous prison (though only San Quentin and Leavenworth ring a bell to me). While the Cube is in itself a prison, the idea of the prison is not necessarily always physical, and some cases can be social and even mental. Kazan for instance is imprisoned by his autism, however it is interesting that he is the only one who manages to escape, possibly because it is his autism that actually makes him free. Worth is a prisoner of his boring job, and Quentin is a prisoner of his rage, which results in his destruction in the end. While putting on the face of a cop, as the movie progresses we slowly come to understand the destructive nature of his personality.