"Cube" of Death

Hey there. No friends, I don't mean a killer crouton. lol I caught this flick during the weekend and I thought it was great. Maybe cause I'm just a freak when it comes to numbers. I thought the whole concept of being enclosed in a cube where certain rooms are traps was just too good to pass up. I wouldn't doubt it if this film, in some way, shape or form, had anything to do with the Saw films. And I love me some Saw. lol

The intro to the movie ended up raising some questions at the end of the movie. I'll tell you why at the end of this post. A man by the name of Alderson, I believe, wakes up in the cube. The cube has 6 small doors on each wall, which seem more like latches to me, and after opening a few and peeking inside, he decides to enter one of the adjacent rooms. After a brief moment, and a quick "swoosh", the guy falls apart all diced up in little cubes. Obviously, the room was trapped and the dude paid the price.

The movie then continues with several people running into each in quick succession. The party has no idea how they got there or where "there" exactly is. After a quick discussion on who everyone is, Quentin, the cop, realizes that Rennes is an escape artist and is known for escaping from several prisons. Rennes quickly assumes the task of getting out and devises a method of "booting" each room to see if they are safe. He'll tie his boot with the shoelaces and toss it into rooms. If anything happens to the boot, try the next room, if not, he assumes it to be safe. After going through a few rooms, his method fails him as when he jumps into a room, an acid sprayer comes out of the wall and gets him right in the face. The others pull him out but it's too late for him. As his face disintegrates, the others watch in horror.

Quentin, then figures that they were chosen for a reason and are not there by chance. He then asks what everyone's occupation is. It is then stated that Holloway is a doctor, Worth is a "nobody" guy just doing office stuff and Leaven just hangs out with friends and goes to school. Quentin, putting his cop skills to use, observes that all jewelry was taken away yet Leaven was allowed to have her glasses. Since he believes that everyone has a purpose, he tries to pry into Leaven and asks her what else she does. It is then revealed that she is a math whiz.

Leaven, then, realizes that in between the rooms, there is a set of 3 digit numbers. She quickly theorizes that if one of the numbers is a prime number, then the room is trapped. This theory serves them well until they reach a room that is surrounded by prime numbers. Quentin then climbs to the ceiling (the rooms have handle bars across all the walls, including the ceiling and floor) and opens the door. Kazan, then falls through the door and nearly crushes Leaven. It turns out that he is mentally handicapped and Holloway wants to bring him along where the others feel he'll just be a burden. Quentin is quick to believe that Kazan is a trap, there to slow them down and to get them killed.

As the party continues, Quentin jumps into a "safe" room only find that it contains a trap. Blade like "strings" attached from the ceiling and floor encircle Quentin and right before they close in on him, he jumps though a gap and heads towards the door, but not before getting his leg sliced. Temper flaring, he blames Leaven saying she screwed up but Leaven reassures that the numbers are not prime. This makes them reassess their strategy.

While sitting around, and some heavy questioning by Quentin, Worth reveals that he is an architect and that he was hired to build the "outer shell" of the cube. He states that the cube is some 400+ feet on each side. Leaven quickly does the math and figures that the cube has some 17.5K rooms. Knowing that, she realizes that the numbers in between the rooms are the coordinates of the rooms. After more math analysis, she denounces that they are 7 rooms from the edge of the cube. With a renewed sense of accomplishment, the party continues.

They then reach a room where all the adjacent rooms have traps. Frustrated, Leaven suggests they back track but Quentin wasn't having it. He decides that the room under them, is their best chance to get through. It's a sound activated room and when they yell into it, spikes shoot out of each wall covering every inch of the room. Kazan, not fully understanding the situation, yells out at random activating the trap. Quentin and the others feel that he'll get them killed but Holloway insists that he'll be quiet. After some tense moments, one by one, they get to the other room. As Quentin ascends, Kazan makes a sound, damn near getting Quentin shanked. Enraged, he shouts at everyone that Kazan's purpose to kill them all and that he is practically dead weight.

They finally reach the edge of the cube and when they open the door they see that the outer shell is not attached to the cube. Holloway volunteers to try and swing to the other side via a rope made of their clothes. As she swings, the cube shakes, causing her to fall. Quentin, reaches out and grabs the rope before she falls to her death. As Holloway climbs and grabs Quentin's hand, she smiles. Quentin does not smile back. He then lets her go. Quentin re-enters the room and tells everyone that she slipped. The party then decides that a time out is needed and get some sleep.

While sleeping, Quentin grabs Leaven and takes her to an adjacent room trying to convince her they are the key to surviving. A man and a woman, the brains and the brawn. He makes some advances towards her and while she struggles, Kazan and Worth rush in to help her. Worth then fights with Quentin and Quentin ends up tossing Worth into the room below. Worth starts to laugh and everyone peeks in to see why. Worth laughs because after all that movement, the room that he fell in has Renne's body in the corner. It was the room that they were in earlier. Everyone thinks that they were going in circles.

After some thought, Leaven realizes that the numbers are not only to detect traps and the coordinates, but that they also tell of where the room relocates too. After some more calculations, she claims that the room that they started in would have relocated to connect them to the outer shell. She also comes to the realization that the trapped rooms are rooms that contain the power of a prime number and that it would take a computer to figure that out on 3 digit numbers. This is where Kazan comes into play. The dude is a genius and he's able to do decipher the numbers with out a hitch.

As they proceed to the first room, Worth tricks Quentin causing him to fall to a room below as the rest of the party move on. Since Quentin was acting mad, they had to ditch the dude for their safety. They finally reach the room and wait for it relocate to the appropriate spot. Once there, they open the door and it reveals the light. Worth refuses to go on, stating that he has nothing to live for. Leaven tries to convince him and as they share a Kodak moment, Quentin appears and stabs Leaven, killing her. Worth, pissed, gets up and fights with Quentin while screaming at Kazan to go through the door before it's too late. Quentin stabs Worth, believing to have killed him. He then sets his sight on Kazan who tried to get through the door. As Kazan gets through, Quentin is at the doorway reaching out for him. Worth then grabs Quentin, stopping him in his tracks. At that moment, the room starts to relocate with Quentin's body in between 2 rooms. As the room shifts, it crushes Quentin's body. Worth then lies down next to Leaven.

Kazan, being the only one to get out, proceeds to walk towards the light. Once it engulfs him, the credits roll.

Now this is where my question comes in. If the characters each had a purpose, what was the purpose of Alderson? His appearance in the cube was for no more than 3 mins and nothing is ever mentioned of him since none of the other characters met with him. It's intriguing to me that they would place this character in there and not reveal his purpose. I know that there is 2 more flicks in the Cube series and I'm definitely thinking of checking em out. You know what I just noticed... Alderson is the only character in the movie poster... How odd.

Don't go getting trapped in a cube now. Later.