From the start, CUBE's outward simplicity had masked a complex interior. The basic idea is simple enough six individuals are dropped in a maze of infinite rooms and must find a way out before they die of thirst and starvation. But when my writing partner Andre Bijelic and I sat down to put pen to paper, we realized that we were designing a Chinese puzzle from the ground up. As we exerted our less than spectacular mathematical abilities we also struggled to marry this abstract setting with the very human story of survival.

Enter, Graeme Manson, the third writing partner who forged the final links to join each piece of the puzzle. When the final touches were added to the script, and the first day of the shoot approached, I thought we had overcome the biggest obstacle. I was wrong.

While all of CUBE's principal action takes place on one set, it is also a story crammed with stunts and special effects some of which have never before been attempted. Given our very modest budget, I carefully planned and storyboarded every scene in as much detail as possible, leaving nothing to chance. To my surprise and pleasure, these sequences went without a hitch. Even the most ambitious scene where a man is literally cubed and tumbles to the floor in sushi-like pieces worked exquisitely. Ironically, it was the little unexpected details that proved to be the most daunting.

On the first day of our shoot we were faced with the most terrible and perplexing problem the mechanical doors in the hatchways connecting the rooms were too heavy. Even the mighty Maurice Dean Wint using all his strength could not move the doors an inch. I realized that somehow, I was going to have to shoot around the doors that did not work a terrifying thought considering that the entire script revolves around theng and closing of doors. With no time to wait for a solution, we were forced to jump into a huge dialogue scene, giving our actors a midnight call to inform them of this change.

Fortunately, the cast was more than up to the challenge. They worked the scene as though we had spent a week in rehearsal and my heart leapt with joy as they played each beat better than I thought possible. By the time we had finished our day, the door dilemma had been solved by the effects wizard at JJAMB and we were back on schedule. Adding an extra spark of enthusiasm, the second unit coordinator and engineering genius William Phillips had invented a brilliant system to close the doors automatically using only a few feet of rope and materials bought with five dollars worth of coupons from a hardware store!

The remaining days of our rapidly dwindling schedule delivered many more unwanted surprises, including the unexpected and maddening effect of the set's intense colors. At times, the distinction between fiction and reality blurred as we felt as trapped in the cube as the characters we were filming. Yet each step of the way I was surrounded by dedicated and creative people. My producers Mehra Meh and Betty Orr, cinematographer Derek Rogers, production designer Jasna Stefanovic, and the cast, Nicole deBoer, Nicky Guadagni, David Hewlett, Andrew Miller Julian Richings, Wayne Robson and Maurice Dean Wint outmatched the production's physical and mental hardships.

When the shoot was wrapped, I had the undefinable pleasure of watching the pieces fit neatly into place. In an ominous way, CUBE seemed to define itself independently of my contribution. As each element was layered on to the next from montage to sound, to special effects, to music the film revealed a richness and uniqueness that exceeded my expectations. In this respect, I feel less like the man in charge than the subject of my own experiment, the results of which, taught me about the joys of collaboration, the dangers of the unexpected, and one of nature's guiding principals: small doesn't mean simple.