KAZAN’S PLEA
Film analysis of the 1997 film Cube through the lens of AI and neurodivergence.
By: Phoenix McElroy
The 1997 film Cube, is an exploration of the ways automated technology, when going unchecked and unregulated, manipulates neurodivergent people. The film, while not directly containing AI, still acts as a representation for the continued discrimination, perpetuated by AI, against neurodivergent individuals. The entire film takes place in a giant automated cube. The cube is filled with rooms, following a 3D grid pattern, and some have traps in them. There are 7 people who the audience sees trapped in the Cube, each being randomly chosen by the government. Of the ones known is a man named Kazan, who is noted to be neurodivergent in some way that’s not specified. The relationship between Kazan, the Cube, and the other people he is stuck with highlight the challenges neurodivergent people face and the way they are made even more difficult by technology. The Cube repeatedly acts as a weapon against Kazan, isolating him, and leaving him with immense trauma even with his escape into the white light in the end.
This film follows 7 characters in total: Alderson who dies immediately to the cube, Quentin, the judgmental self-proclaimed leader, Rennes, an escape artist, Leaven, a mathematics student, Holloway, a free clinic nurse, Worth, who helped design the cube, and Kazan who is noted to be neurodivergent but also incredibly smart. Initially, the group only consists of Quentin, Rennes, Leaven, Holloway, and Worth, who all quickly find each other only a couple rooms apart. It isn’t till 1/3rd through the movie that while traversing the cube they discover Kazan. While the neurotypical characters are all placed within proximity to one another, giving them easier access, Kazan is isolated from the others. This means Kazan was unfairly disadvantaged, with the only possible reasoning being his neurological differences. The Cube is actively alienating him to make him the other, the same way AI algorithms misunderstand and take advantage of neurotypical people through various means. AI is being used to put more obstacles in the way of neurodivergent people because they don’t function the same as neurotypicals. Kazan is also then therefore alienated by the group members as well because many of them don’t have as long to build a connection with him as the other characters. His initial isolation due the the Cube leads to him being seen as dangerous and unstable.
The only group member to express any sort of empathy for Kazan is Holloway. She quickly realizes upon meeting him that he is different from the other people of their group. He bangs his head against the wall and fidgets with his fingers, likely a self soothing technique in the unknown environment. Instead of demonizing these actions like some of the other characters, Holloway simply talks to him. Her voice is gentle and not accusatory, and she genuinely seems to his value to the group, in contrast to Quentin’s significant disdain for him. When Kazan begins banging his head Holloway is the only one to try to change the action so he’s no longer in pain. The actions he’s doing are representative of the relationship between neurodivergent people and technology. The pain Kazan feels from this constant movement is how neurodivergent people are victims to technology. The Cube indirectly targets common triggers for autistic people – unknown environments, over stimulation, breaks in habit, etc. – which shapes itself as his repeated pain. The pain doesn’t stop until Holloway places her hand in between his head in the wall. The intervention of a 3rd party is the only thing that can end the weaponization of AI technology against neurodivergent people. People repeatedly getting hurt and taken advantage of will not stop unless there is a change. The same way without Holloway Kazan would have continued banging his head against the cube.
Hollway’s involvement is from a place of empathy, something technology lacks, because she no longer wants to see him getting hurt. The film is trying to get the audience to empathize for Kazan as this person who is being taken advantage of by this technology and showing how destructive it can be. The technology has no ability to change its actions without a human informing it to. The Cube does have negative effects on all people but the majority of neurotypical people are acting as bystanders instead of showing any concern for other people. While neurotypical people are subject to the negative effects of technology, it is neurodivergent people who face the most continued discrimination from it. Everyone can get flagged for false positives with AI, but it is neurodivergent people’s speech and vocal patterns that makes them significantly more likely to get wrongly accused of AI usage, by AI. This is why Kazan has to go through a lot more mentally by being in the Cube than neurotypical people and why he requires the extra assistance from Holloway. He also faces more obstacles than the others because he doesn’t act the way some people expect someone to act “normally” which makes people like Quentin try to root for, and actively plan, his downfall.
While Holloway represents the empathetic people who want to support those who are neurodivergent from the discrimination they face, Quentin represents the people who don’t see anything wrong with the way they’re being treated. From the start Quentin is the first character we see. He takes charge by opening doors and finding the first initial people of the group. His high engagement with the Cube and ability to take charge also translates to his impulsiveness and judgemental nature. He believes he is the best and deserves to make the decisions. When faced with Kazan, who isn’t “normal” to him, he can do nothing but assume Kazan has a lack of intelligence. It isn’t until Kazan discovers the safe pathway that Quentin sees any significance to him. Even after that though, Quentin still places himself above everyone else and when Worth, Quentin, and Kazan make it to the end he tries to stimulate the weaponization of technology against Kazan.
After Holloway has died and Quentin, Worth, and Kazan are the only ones left to find the escape. Worth is telling Kazan to go to the door, because he sees Kazan as the most deserving of the exit. Quentin, hearing this and wanting to make it to the end over Kazan, grabs a metal piece from the Cube and stabs Worth. While this is happening Kazan stands at the exit, a white light encompassing him, and acting as a sense of freedom from the oppressive environment. When Quentin notices this he realizes he himself won’t escape and makes it his goal to bring Kazan down with him. Quentin rushes to the exit and goes to pull Kazan back into the door so it crushes him. Then with Worth’s last amount of energy he grabs Quentin placing him directly in the door’s seam. The door slowly closes, crushing Quentin, and putting his egocentric nature to an end. With Quentin’s lack of empathy he represents the people who do not care about other people’s struggles. He sees the Cube as one last way to trap Kazan with the rest of them, making him like them, despite his inherent differences. Therefore acting as a catalyst for discrimination and seeing technology as a way to force those who are different into assimilating to the “average” experience of life.
Right now AI is being introduced into the diagnosing process, and just like Quentin uses the Cube to try to make Kazan like the rest of the group, AI is being used to make neurotypical people more “human”. Just because technology has come to the forefront of our world, engineers and other people think it can fix everything, especially that which they don’t understand. Due to a lack of empathy they see people, like Kazan, as unnatural and needing to be changed. Just like Quentin, who can’t set aside his unknowing, and instead continues the systematic weaponization of technology against neurodivergent people like Kazan. He believes to make Kazan like everyone else, Kazan must die in the Cube with everyone else. Quentin’s failure proves to the audience Kazan’s differences do not make him any less deserving of the freedom that lies beyond the white light. He then gets to finally end the movie by walking into this white light to a world beyond and away from the Cube. He finally gets to rise beyond the discrimination and prove his worth by being the only one to escape.
The Cube, while not directly incorporating AI, gives a nod to the inequity caused by growing technology. The Cube is consistently used as a weapon against all people but primarily Kazan. Kazan’s nature gives him no choice but to interact with the Cube as he does and it takes Holloway’s empathy and guidance to be able to show the others his humanity. Worth then gives him the final push towards freedom, because the only way change will be made in society is through the interference of bystanders to oppression. Kazan, the final survivor, lives to see his future beyond the shackles of technology acting as a final signal of hope to the neurodivergent community. One day change will be made so no person must be trapped within other peoples’ ignorance.
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