Thinking outside the box: Buried

In episodic TV, the term "Bottle Show" refers to episodes where everything takes place within an entire room or set. Spanish director Rodrigo Cortes does the idea one better, setting the entire 95 minutes of Buried inside the confines of a wooden coffin.

Taking his cues from Hitchcock's Rope and Lifeboat, Cortes makes the most of this limitation, elevating it from mere exercise to a completely immersive, claustrophobic experience.

Ryan Reynolds is a civilian contractor in Iraq who wakes up after a convoy attack to find he's buried in a coffin somewhere in the middle of the desert. Cortes has put himself into a seeming nightmare of lighting design, with a cigarette lighter and BlackBerry the only sources of illumination.

As air, time and cell battery life all run out, Buried becomes much more of an Iraq film than revealed in the marketing, as Reynolds frantically tries to reach somebody who will listen and take action to free him from his fate. The confinement of being trapped with no way out becomes both commentary on the American lack of exit strategy in Iraq but also the complete modern dependence on cell phones and electronic devices. At times, Reynolds' BlackBerry seems even more of a ghastly tormentor than his captors on the phone.

At times the film gets a bit too caught up in trying to convince the audience that it's still an action movie -- the soundtrack becomes a little too intrusive in places, trying sustain a sense of action! Buried isn't always perfect, but it's a fantastic lesson in economy and inventiveness. Reynolds is in a one-man show proposition similar to 127 Hours and manages to hold his own.

Buried is definitely worth checking out and Rodrigo Cortes is someone to watch for.