BLACK BOX (2020)

Studio:      Blumhouse/Amazon Studios
Director:    Emmanuel Osei-Kuffour Jr.
Writer:      Emmanuel Osei-Kuffour Jr., Stephen Herman
Producer:  John Brister
Stars:     Mamoudou Athie, Phylicia Rashad, Amanda Christine, Tosin Morohunfola, Charmaine Bingwa, Donald Watkins

Review Score:

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Summary:

A widowed father with amnesia undergoes an experimental memory recovery treatment that challenges him to unlock the secrets of his true identity.

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Synopsis:     Show/Hide Spoilers

Six months after surviving a car crash that killed his wife Rachel, Nolan Wright struggles with severe memory loss as well as raising his young daughter Ava. Nolan’s doctor friend Gary advises Nolan to follow-up on an offer to undergo experimental memory recovery treatment conducted by Dr. Lillian Brooks.

Lillian hypnotizes Nolan during their first session. While hypnotized, an unseen figure grabs Nolan in his subconscious. Nolan informs Lillian this figure plagues his dreams as well.

Lillian uses her experimental headset called “black box” to convert Nolan’s memories into immersive virtual experiences. Nolan relives a memory of being the groom in a wedding, but everyone’s faces are blurred, including the bride’s. A frightening man contorted backwards crawls toward Nolan, jolting him out of the memory.

In his next “black box” session, Nolan encounters the faceless wife, upset from being physically abused, inside an apartment. The ‘Backwards Man’ crawls out of a child’s crib and attacks.

Nolan becomes confused because he never lived in an apartment with Rachel. Gary assures Nolan he was never abusive toward his wife either. Nolan wonders if he had an affair.

Nolan finds the apartment in reality. Nolan has a brief flashback of a man falling down the building’s stairs. Nolan knocks on the door of the apartment from the memory, but leaves abruptly when he sees the unit occupied by a woman named Miranda and her young daughter Ashley.

Nolan tells Gary about the apartment. Gary looks into Nolan’s medical history and learns that Dr. Brooks first saw Nolan on the night of the accident that caused Nolan brief brain death.

Nolan returns to Lillian for another session. Nolan relives the wedding and apartment memories and is attacked by the Backwards Man again. Nolan then has a memory of being in a hospital. The faceless woman morphs into Miranda. Nolan realizes he is actually reliving the memories of Miranda’s abusive husband Thomas, who was also Dr. Brooks’ son.

Nolan recovers with Thomas’s consciousness now in control of Nolan’s body. Lillian explains that Thomas fell down a staircase two years ago. Lillian’s experimental work recreated her son’s mental data and uploaded his consciousness into Nolan’s brain dead body, thereby reconfiguring Nolan’s brain.

Lillian further adds that Thomas now has a second chance with Miranda and their daughter Ashley. Thomas asks about Nolan’s daughter Ava. Lillian dismisses Thomas’s concern.

In Nolan’s body, Thomas sends Ava to stay with Gary. Thomas then goes to Miranda and explains what happened. Upon realizing Miranda removed all photos of him from their apartment, Thomas becomes abusive again. Miranda knocks Thomas unconscious.

Thomas wakes back at Gary’s place in front of Ava. Confused why he went there, Thomas sees the Backwards Man’s reflection in a car window before racing back to Lillian for help.

Disappointed to discover Thomas returned to his abusive ways, Lillian puts Thomas back in the “black box.” Thomas returns to the apartment in his memory. The Backwards Man morphs into Nolan. Thomas and Nolan begin fighting.

Having deduced what happened, Gary barges into Lillian’s lab with Ava. Meanwhile, Thomas prepares to kill Nolan inside the memory.

Thomas suddenly remembers he tumbled down the staircase when Miranda pushed him after he struck their daughter. Recognizing the violent man he still is, Thomas lets Nolan go. Thomas exits the apartment in despair and recedes into darkness.

Nolan’s consciousness recovers back in his body. Lillian desperately tries to bring her son back again, but Gary breaks the “black box.”

Nolan returns to life with Ava. Miranda learns from a newspaper that Dr. Brooks was dismissed from her position due to the scandal. However, Lillian privately resumes her research as she discovers her son’s mind still exists inside the “black box.”

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Review:

Six months ago, Nolan lost his wife in a devastating car accident. Nolan also lost most of his memories in that same crash. Still recovering from brief brain death, Nolan uses Post-It notes to remember basic tasks like where to put clean plates, which is to say nothing of how hard it is to remember more important matters like picking up his daughter Ava from elementary school.

Luckily, Ava learned to handle herself. She’s one of those too-cute movie kids who more commonly populate romantic comedies. Despite an age not yet in double digits, Ava’s beyond-her-years wisdom and consistently chipper optimism keep Nolan buoyed. She even makes dinner most nights, deftly tapping around dad’s phone for recipes and plotting grocery store pickups like a pro.

Relative newcomer Amanda Christine steals every single second when she overtakes the screen as Ava. The young actress still has raw instincts that see her momentarily forgetting technical tricks like not letting her eyes flick toward the camera. But the personality she puts into Ava compensates for less personable co-stars who are no match for her vibrancy anyway. Don’t be surprised if Amanda Christine becomes a breakout.

“Black Box’s” other big acting boon comes courtesy of Phylicia Rashad. Rashad plays Dr. Brooks, a neuroscientist who believes Nolan could be an ideal candidate for her experimental memory recovery treatment. A headset dubbed “black box” is the key component in her research. The device purports to probe a subject’s subconscious and create immersive virtual experiences out of whatever memory fragments it can find.

Because the movie requires imaginary science to power its premise, it falls on Dr. Brooks to deliver plenty of plot-pushing dialogue full of foundation-laying exposition. That’s how Rashad earns her MVP trophy. It takes a veteran of her considerable caliber to give gravitas to thankless tech-speak. Simply by virtue of being Phylicia Rashad, Dr. Brooks instantly commands ‘sit up straight and pay attention’ respect, making the most out of a character who might otherwise fade into a mere fiction facilitator. “Black Box” could never become as gripping without the way Rashad expertly cooks basic screenwriting necessities.

“Black Box” doesn’t take long to get spooky. More suggestively supernatural than tangibly terrifying, a couple of typical “starter scares” lead off proceedings. Hands come from behind to land on shoulders. Nightmare sequences feature faceless people. A creature-like contortionist crawls backwards before going on the attack in Nolan’s strange visions.

“Black Box” takes its time showing us the substance building behind the story however. To make your mind race, movie mysteries must inspire constant questions like, what really happened in between two specific scenes, who might really be responsible for some upsetting action, and so on. “Black Box” hits a hurdle on that front during the establishing stage.

When Dr. Brooks begins delving into Nolan’s mind, “Black Box” doesn’t dole out firm whos, whats, wheres, or whens. We see strange things, meet unidentified people, and are taken to unfamiliar places. Since initial clues don’t come with context to chew on, our brains don’t know what questions to ask. Are we supposed to wonder about secret identities, extramarital affairs, possible murders, or what exactly? In the dark ends up being a befuddling place to wait patiently until “Black Box” readies to reveal more concrete secrets.

In the meantime, “Black Box” fortunately manages to mold intrigue out of crumbs of crumbs. Even with a semi-familiar setup and without truly twisty suspense, drama drives the movie thanks to simple, solid performances and a to-the-point pace with only a minimal percentage of fat on the runtime.

“Black Box” isn’t a ‘knock your socks off’ thriller full of epic events and spectacular shocks. It’s not designed to be. It’s just straight science-fiction, no chaser. Its no-frills approach to quiet chills anchored on family trauma make it a compelling little ride that’s ideal for a quick hit of eerie, sometimes sentimentally sweet, entertainment.

Review Score: 75

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