Details Emerge on Richard Kelly's "The Box"

Donnie Darko director Richard Kelly seems to be moving on from his failed sophomoric effort Southland Tales with yet another pseudo-sci-fi film, The Box. USA Today scooped the details on his new film starring James Marsden and Cameron Diaz. Inspired by an '80s Twilight Zone episode, the film involves a mysterious box which is delivered to the starring couple with an intriguing moral dilemma: They can press the button inside the box to receive $1 million, but doing so will also kill someone they don't know.

Kelly calls this his "first grown-up film", which is hopefully a good sign after the catastrophic Southland Tales. With a simpler premise than his previous films, I think this film will be more easily digestable his past efforts, and will hopefully garner him some much-needed box office success. This is the sort of gear changing that I think M. Night Shyamalan, someone I consider one of Kelly's cinematic peers, would do well to follow. Both are overly ambitious directors who have seen major flops in their careers, but Kelly is certainly the wiser for attempting to change his formula.

And while it is certainly aiming to be mainstream, it won't be without Kelly's trademark quirk. The film will still manage to fit in references to teleporting, the '76 Viking mission to mars, '70s kitsch culture.

As a fan of Donnie Darko ever since it hit DVD, I can only hope that this film sees the sort of cinematic success that Richard Kelly deserves.

[Source: USA Today]