Quartile rating: 7/10 · 1 rating
A group of strangers find themselves trapped in a maze-like prison. It soon becomes clear that each of them possesses the peculiar skills necessary to escape, if they don't wind up dead first.
Cube is a genuinely singular piece of low-budget Canadian sci-fi horror. Its central conceit — a deadly shifting geometric maze with no explained origin or purpose — is strikingly original and executed with remarkable efficiency given its constraints. The single-set cinematography cleverly uses lighting color shifts to differentiate rooms and build dread. The plot is tight and smartly uses mathematics as a survival mechanism, though it thins out as the characters are picked off. Acting is uneven; some performances tip into melodrama, particularly in the heightened conflict scenes. The ending is hauntingly ambiguous and memorable — the lone survivor stepping into blinding white light is iconic — though it leaves many threads deliberately unresolved. Its novelty is its greatest asset: almost nothing before or since has felt quite like it.