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A mysterious man presents a couple with a box, telling them that if they push its button they will receive a large amount of cashbut someone in the world will die as a result. Such is the simple premise of the Richard Matheson short story “Button, Button,” which has been adapted by writer-director Richard Kelly into “The Box.” Opening Nov. 6, the film stars Frank Langella as the man and Cameron Diaz and James Marsden as the couple.
“It was always this kind of great blueprint for an act one of a film,” said Kelly of adapting the story, “and then it was like, ‘Where do we go after this has happened?’ I wanted to know what happens to that couple, and ultimately who is [the man] and who does he work for. . . . ?”
To expand the story, Kelly modeled the couple after his parents, setting the story in Virginia, where he grew up, in 1976, when his father was working at NASA, and even incorporating a medical accident his mother suffered. … read more »
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