Seriously what is this movie ?

A bunch of people wake up in ugly clothes, in a silent and deadly cubic structure composed of silent and deadly cubic rooms. Nothing much happens during the movie, most characters are met during the first minutes of the story, and the soundtrack is at best an evocation of random sci-fi tropes, and yet, this is a masterpiece.

The art of not saying.

Perhaps the strength of Cube comes from its poverty… There is not much to expect in terms of scenario details, costumes, famous actors, or action scenes. Most of the movie is calm and slow, and this is precisely what makes Cube stand out and leave a mark on the viewer : the power of evocation. Later on, a prequel titled Cube Zero tried to explain what or who was behind the cube, but in the original movie there is nothing to know, the cube simply is.

And isn’t the form of a cube particularly interesting from a philosophical point of view ?

From what I can remember, the cube is the shape of the earthly perfection, grounded in the material reality, which makes it different from the sphere that represents the heavens. There could be a hidden meaning in the movie, yet I’m not really sure what it could be… At some point in the movie, as they process through the rooms of the maze, the characters realize that they are just moving around in circles, going back again and again to the rooms they visited earlier, there seems to be no escape from this perfect shape…

Gore galore.

For a 1997 production, I find the CGI to be quite good, except for a few scenes, we do not see them much, and they blend in well with the overall tone of the pictures.
It seems a special effort has been made on shades and colors all along the movie : each room has a distinct color, and while we don’t clearly see the logic behind it, (red rooms don’t mean flame traps for example) it adds a distinct feeling for each scene of Cube, in a way that remind of theater more than cinema.
The clothing of characters is also bland : gray jackets, white underwear, as if they are also parts of the structure even if they are just normal garments, it seems like everything is done so the viewer’s focus stays on the cube, and the deep tension that never leaves the plot.

The gore scenes are superb, of course the effects are products of their time, but there is a majesty in seeing a human body slowly falling into cubes after being instantly slashed through by a giant fries-cutter.
How can existential questions pair so well with the most basic violence and bloodiness ? This is a mystery but the fact is that they pair quite well here. And after all, the most mysterious people of all times, the Egyptians, were also famous for dealing with organs and dead bodies.

To the limit.

In the end of the film, the question arises about the outer world. What happens when one leaves the cube ? While I have my own theories on the subject, the movie really leaves this an open question. We don’t really know, except that it looks like the exact opposite of the inside of the cube. The ending is also one of the scenes where the soundtrack becomes really present, in a sharp contrast with the previous scenes, there is relief, but also frightening questions in the end of Cube.