The Sci-Fi Horror Classic With A Controversial Star Trek Icon, Stream Without Netflix
Most film fans are confused about the term “high-concept,” thinking that it describes a movie that is very complex or otherwise hard to understand. In reality, the opposite is true: a high-concept movie is one with a very simple, very engaging premise, one you can ideally describe in a single sentence. Cube (a movie about trying to survive a series of death trap rooms) is perhaps the best high-concept horror movie ever made, and it’s one that you can stream for free on Tubi today.
Cube
Going a bit beyond its concept, what is Cube about? Several strangers wake up in a mysterious complex in which each room is filled with deadly traps that can only be solved through quick wits and quicker reflexes.
Solving enough puzzles might just help this ragtag gang survive, but the deadliest thing inside these rooms may not be the traps—it may very well be the desperate people trying to escape them.
The Cast
The cast of Cube isn’t filled with big names, but it does have some serious genre veterans in it. For example, the movie stars Stargate veteran David Ian Hewlett and Maurice Dean Wint, who memorably starred in the largely unknown TV show RoboCop: Prime Directives.
Notably, the movie also stars Nicole de Boer, someone who became somewhat controversial when she began starring in Star Trek: Deep Space Nine one year after this film came out.
Ezri
On that Trek spinoff, there was a popular character named Jadzia Dax who was a Trill, meaning she had an alien symbiont inside of her that has had generations of host bodies. Jadzia was a fan-favorite character played by Terry Farrell, and she was fired from the show after requesting to become only a recurring character in Deep Space Nine’s final season.
After Jadzia was unceremoniously killed at the end of season 6, she was replaced with a new character (and host), Ezri Dax, played by Nicole de Boer.
The actor was great in the show, even better than she was in Cube (and that’s saying something). However, Farrell was beloved by fans, and it took many years for all the details to come out about why she left the show.
Audiences at the time largely saw de Boer as an outsider replacing a cherished character, and controversy about that replacement continues in nerd circles to this day.
Reception To Cube
As for the de Boer of 1997, it’s a fair bet she was happy simply to be part of such a successful movie. Cube was made on a shoestring budget of $350,000 Canadian dollars, and it went on to earn $9 million at the box office.
After becoming a financially successful cult hit, Cube spawned a sequel, a prequel, and a Japanese remake, but none were quite as good as the original.
When Cube first came out, it was a movie that impressed audiences more than critics. On Rotten Tomatoes, the film currently has a critical rating of 63 percent and an audience rating of 76 percent.
Critics generally claimed that the film didn’t always make the best use of its high-concept premise but that the pace and intelligence of the film make it worth the watch.
Stream It Now
Personally, I remain impressed at how much Cube feels like an almost elementally pure movie: with no real setup and a relentless pace, the film hits the ground running and instantly immerses you in its gripping premise.
That premise is arguably even more impressive for fans who have grown tired of torture porn films like Saw and Hostel. Forget being tortured by a malevolent person—how much scarier is it to be in a life-and-death situation where you don’t even know who or what is doing this to you, much less how to survive?
As for you, will you think Cube is the horror indie hit it’s cracked up to be or will you find this film more painful than an acid trap? You won’t know until you stream it for free on Tubi today. Of course, if you start binge-watching the entire franchise, you might discover the real cube that none of us can truly escape: the almighty television.
