Movies
Four Boxes
Four Boxes has a good idea or two, maybe even one that could be considered fairly original. But with its slow as molasses pace and multitude of uneven, boring topics, it is neither memorable nor entertaining. With a better script, its hook could have made for a great film, but as it stands, it’s the most unthrilling thriller I’ve seen this year.
While the power of the almighty twist can make or break a film for many viewers, one thing we’ve all learned over the years is that an entire movie should never hinge on its reveal, let alone be built around it. It’s not that it necessarily ruins the whole flick, it’s just that walking out of the theatre with disenchantment doesn’t exactly leave you with the best of dispositions, and it really doesn’t give you a reason for repeat viewings. Films like Psycho have endured because the entire film is compelling and endlessly entertaining, whether it’s because of Hitch’s style or the incredible performances by Janet Leigh and Anthony Perkins. Other films like Four Boxes are perhaps best left as a short, with one possibly good idea floating among a lot of trite concepts.
Truth be told, there really isn’t a lot to Four Boxes, which tells the story of Trevor (Justin Kirk) and Rob (Sam Rosen), two friends who run an estate liquidation service – which basically means that they go into recently deceased people’s home, rummage through their belongings, and sell them for profit. Arriving at a new “client’s” house, Trevor takes charge of the operation while Rob runs around acting hood and using obnoxious slang with his coffee-house hipster fiancé, Amber (Terryn Westbrook). Rob finds a website called Fourboxes.tv, a live webcam feed featuring a hooded character named Havoc who lives in a cage, carries around a leaf blower, and builds bombs in his basement. As the video feed becomes stranger and stranger, the love triangle between Amber, Rob, and her ex-boyfriend Trevor becomes more and more likely to reduce their friendships to a smoldering pile of ash.
Most of the film focuses on Trevor, who spends most of his days in the house preoccupied with the low-res video feed, trying to figure out exactly what it is he’s looking at. Being very grainy and off-color, you’ll spend most of the flick trying to make sense of what’s on the computer screen, which in turn makes most of the characters’ observations about what’s going on kind of a stretch. On top of that, Havoc spends most of the time walking around ominously and playing with his leaf blower, which isn’t exactly interesting.
The rest of the film deals with Amber’s ever-changing direction of affection, causing all the character to become petty and even more unlikable then they were in the first place. If it wasn’t their misplaced emotions and bad ethics that makes them unsympathetic and downright childish, their Juno-esque dialogue certainly doesn’t help. I’m not really sure who would say “We’re gonna push plastic strollers full of babies around Disneyland, a’ight?!?” in real life, but going for realism apparently isn’t on the agenda for Four Boxes. The tedious nature of these two topics drags the film out to no end, making the 84 minute runtime feel like an eternity. Watching someone watch bad TV and bicker about their relationships is a little too mundane for a feature film without a good gimmick that runs throughout.
The actors certainly make the best of the material they’re working with, giving decent performances under the circumstances. The horrendous nature of their lines is explained in the third act, but by that point, you kind of hate all of them and don’t really care. But since that’s the point, I guess it’s commendable… but still not in a way that makes me like the film.
Four Boxes has a good idea or two, maybe even one that could be considered fairly original. But with its slow as molasses pace and multitude of uneven, boring topics, it is neither memorable nor entertaining. With a better script, its hook could have made for a great film, but as it stands, it’s the most unthrilling thriller I’ve seen this year.
I first heard about The Mandela Catalogue through a couple of nephews who were obsessed with the ARG’s sinister mythology. It was only after watching Wendigoon’s in-depth analysis of the series that I realized just how deep this rabbit hole goes.
In fact, I’d already been exposed to the nightmarish visuals of Alex Kister’s YouTube creation for years at that point without even realizing that it was the origin of several viral “cursed images” and spooky memes that had leaked into the wider internet – with this viral element actually being a part of the Catalogue’s overarching narrative.
Flash-forward to 2026 and the unprecedented success of Kane Parsons’ Backrooms has led to Hollywood betting on horrific internet properties with existing fanbases, which means that Kister’s unique hybrid of both religious and analog horror is finally headed to the big screen with a script written by Kister himself alongside Tyler Clifton.
While this news shouldn’t be too surprising if you’ve been keeping up with the ongoing success of The Mandela Catalogue (both myself and Wendigoon having previously predicted that the series would inevitably make the jump to theaters one day), plenty of horror fans are likely confused as to why so many folks are excited for what appears to be a Hollywood adaptation of a series of creepy .jpeg images under a VHS filter.
With that in mind, today I’d like to invite fellow readers to accompany me as I explore the origins of Alex Kister’s viral hit and attempt to explain exactly why we should all be excited about the Mandela Catalogue adaptation!
From High School Writing Project to Internet Horror Phenomenon
The first seeds of The Mandela Catalogue were sown when Kister was still in high school and developed a writing project subverting religious tropes in a world where biblical history had been altered by demonic forces. A little while later, Kister came across an analog horror contest on Reddit and decided to adapt his ideas into a standalone video where he would edit a religious kids’ cartoon –The Beginner’s Bible: The Nativity, to be specific- into something far creepier. This is how the iconic Overthrone video was born, with this viral short film taking on a life of its own as fans demanded more eerie content from Kister.
Though the video was originally meant to be a one-and-done sort of affair, with Kister actually regretting some of its primitive visuals and considering the editing amateurish and “YouTube-Poop-like” when compared to his current standards, fan reaction and free time during the COVID-19 pandemic encouraged the (then) seventeen-year-old filmmaker to continue producing content set in this same world. The Mandela Catalogue name was inspired by the Mandela Effect conspiracy theory, as the series would slowly begin to explore the subtle horror of alternate histories.
Inspired by existential dread brought on by extended periods of quarantine as well as a personal crisis of faith, Kister continued to expand his alternate timeline where the rise of Christianity had been prevented by what was presumably the Devil disguised as the Archangel Gabriel. This alternate course of fictional events led to the existence of certain paranormal anomalies that had come to be accepted as “normal” by the 1990s, which is why most of the series’ supernatural horror is presented in such a matter-of-fact manner.
Most of this background information and religious lore is delivered by increasingly cryptic broadcasts and in-universe PSAs, as well as the occasional found footage video, that often have to be decoded by clever viewers. Of course, it’s the consistently disturbing imagery that made the series so popular – much of which was originally created by Kister on a smartphone!
The Alternates: Horror’s Most Unsettling Modern Monsters
The show’s early episodes mostly take place within the fictional Mandela County in Wisconsin and depict life in a world where demonic entities are capable of using media to enter our reality. This process usually involves scaring victims into killing themselves and then repurposing their bodies as horrific doppelgangers referred to as “Alternates”. This terrifying phenomenon has become so common that local police already have specialized procedures in place to deal with the issue, though this usually consists of simply ignoring calls for help so as to avoid spreading so-called “Metaphysical Awareness Disorder” any further.
Over time, Kister would expand this mythology and incorporate different kinds of Alternates into the mix, though the story never stopped deconstructing religious concepts. The series’ second volume exponentially increased both video quality and the overall narrative scope as we began to follow the lives of characters who had already grown up in this dystopian hellscape where the government is forced to prohibit religion, television, and even mirrors in the hopes of mitigating the damage done by the ongoing invasion of otherworldly entities.
The really interesting part comes into play when you realize exactly how the Alternates make use of scary media in order to spread their demonic influence, with the analog horror of it all being a diegetic part of the story and something of a memetic trap orchestrated by the false Gabriel.
I particularly appreciate how some characters begin to suspect that there’s something wrong with their version of reality and that things weren’t meant to play out this way, especially when Mark utters the haunting line “who have I been praying to all this time?” That’s why I think The Mandela Catalogue is an effective piece of religious horror even if you don’t subscribe to the Christian worldview, as the mere idea of a world where evil has already won is a universally terrifying concept in and of itself. Not only that, but the series’ uncanny analog imagery alone is already worth the price of admission, as you’ve likely already noticed by looking at the pictures accompanying this article.
Why The Feature Adaptation Could Be Horror’s Next Big Success
It’s actually been a whole year since Kister first announced that he had been working on a feature-length screenplay for a Mandela Catalogue movie since 2022, with his proposed story following an ensemble of high-school graduates who uncover a supernatural conspiracy after the mysterious disappearance of a fellow student. This premise sounds similar to narrative elements present in the series’ second volume, but I’m pretty sure that Kister is going to go the Kane Parsons route and make the movie more of a spin-off than a re-imagining of its source material.
While notable Hollywood producers like Aaron B. Koontz, Scott Stuber, and Steven Spielberg himself are backing the upcoming project, I feel like there’s no one better to adapt this deeply personal exploration of faith and the dark side of communication than the person who first came up with it. That’s why I can’t wait to see Kister’s work on the big screen, as I have a feeling that this young filmmaker is the next one on the list about to make cinematic history – especially since this is clearly a passion project that has been in the works for years at this point!
That being said, there’s always a chance that the film could end up unleashing a fresh wave of Alternate incursions, but I guess that’s just a risk we’ll have to take.
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