Review: Cube2: Hypercube

Another group of diverse people awaken to find themselves inside…a slightly different four-dimensional cube structure with doors to other rooms, and no idea how they got here or how to get the hell out. Unlike last time, the rooms bizarrely mess with time and even gravity. Geraint Wyn Davies plays a surly private investigator, Kari Matchett is a psychiatrist, whilst Barbara Gordon is a doddering old lady, who used to be an executive. She may also be a numbers savant, but her brain is deteriorating seemingly by the nanosecond.

 

I’m going to give this 2002 sequel from director/cinematographer Andrzej Sekula (who previously shot “Reservoir Dogs” and “Pulp Fiction”) the same score as its predecessor. However make no mistake, this is almost entirely a remake of the first film. So how does it get the same score? Well, as much as seeing an almost exact replica of the first film does make the whole thing seem kinda pointless and hard to get into, the simple fact is that it’s pretty much an improvement on the original in at least one major facet. In my view, that makes it ultimately about on par with the original in terms of an overall score. So what does that mean for a recommendation? Well, if you’ve seen the first one, I wouldn’t bother. However, if you haven’t seen the original, skip right to this one and don’t look back. You certainly don’t need to have seen the earlier film to understand this one.

 

There’s no Meryl Streep or Monty Clift here, but the cast are an immediate and huge upgrade from the first film where only the competent David Hewlett seemed as though he had acted before. Canadian actor Geraint Wyn Davies will be a familiar face to most of you, and as was the case with Hewlett, the most familiar actor is by far the most talented. The weakest amongst the cast is clearly Barbara Gordon, but it may not be her fault. Her character seems to have been directed/designed to be played for comedy. The approach doesn’t work, nor does it belong, and her character is also the one that most reminds one of the earlier film. Aside from the comical approach to her character, it also seems to serve the exact same function as the savant character from the first film. The exact same, and she’s not the only one. The characters and basic plot are redundant, making it hard to get invested in any of it. You keep watching because you want to see the basic puzzle solved, even though you suspect it won’t be different enough from the original to make it worthwhile. All the gimmicky multi-dimensional and gravitational stuff is like the same car with a slicker, new paint job. At best.

 

This is some seriously lazy screenwriting from Ernie Barbarash (director of “They Wait” and “Hardwired”), Sean Hood (“Halloween: Resurrection”, “The Legend of Hercules”), and Lauren McLaughlan. The film also contains really bad CGI. It’s “Langoliers” bad. That said, the music score by Norman Orenstein is interestingly bizarre. It’s like elevator muzak with an African drum beat and turned into a ringtone. Oddly enough, that proves not to be a bad thing. I also have to say that the cinematography by the director and overall production design is just as good as the first film, even if there’s a bit of grain that bothered me.

 

So look, this is the same damn movie, slightly better due primarily to the upgrade in acting. But I really think this series has squandered a basic premise with a whole bunch of different directions it could’ve but hasn’t gone in. So while I’ll give this the same score as the first film, there’s no doubt that sitting through the same damn story twice leaves one feeling pretty underwhelmed. I’m kinda pissed off about it to be honest. I do love the title, though. It’s genius. See, ‘coz it’s the second film and it’s called "Cube²", or Cube Squared, basically. Hilarious. Oh, and the 2^nd Assistant Director is named September Death. Just thought you’d like to know that.

 

Rating: C+