A Good Study Of Group Dynamics, But It Lacks Any Real Resolution

Rating: 6/10 (2 December 2010)

This movie is really more about group dynamics than science fiction, and it offers a pretty good portrayal of the dynamics of one particular group of people who find themselves caught up in an insane situation and have to learn to work together if they want to have any hope of escape. Everything about this is pretty simple - except for the solution of course. There are no big name actors, the story and the dilemma is straightforward, the sets are very basic. Basically you have six characters who without either explanation for the viewer or understanding for them awaken in a room that's essentially a cube. Upon exploring, they discover that the room leads only to other rooms shaped like cubes (some of which are booby trapped) and they finally realize that all these "cube rooms" are located inside what must be a gigantic cube. The challenge is to find a way out or die of starvation, because there is no food. Each of the characters seems to have a particular gift or talent that might be useful in finding a way out but that also leads to competitiveness and jealousy as the various characters vie for control.
It's interesting to watch the group as it evolves. Starting as strangers who are suspicious of each other, they manage to meld themselves into a reasonably cohesive group, but as the situation grows more desperate that cohesiveness disappears, and they begin to descend into less and less civilized behaviour. All that is well portrayed and quite believable in the circumstances.
The ending of this was disappointing to me. There was no real closure; no explanation at all of what this cube structure was or how these people were taken to it. Personally, I found that a bit unsatisfying. I suppose that leaves everything to the interpretation of the viewer. Were I to take a guess, I'd guess that these folks were like rats in a maze. They were placed there so somebody somewhere could see how they dealt with the situation. To me, that lends itself to a sense that somehow the viewer is supposed to buy into the "alien" theory, since there would really be no need for humans to study group dynamics in such a complex and mystifying way. But that's just a guess on my part.