Ryan Reynolds Was Baffled By A Filming Decision For This Box Office Failure

Rodrigo Cortés's 2010 film "Buried" is a taut and stressful thriller that has maybe the smallest set of any film in history. The story follows a traveling American named Paul Conroy (Ryan Reynolds) who is knocked out and kidnapped while traveling in Iraq. The film begins when Paul regains consciousness inside a coffin, buried alive. He has nothing on his person except for a cigarette lighter and a mobile phone. He is contacted on the phone by his kidnapper, who tells him that he is being held in the coffin for ransom. Paul has to call whoever he can to arrange the ransom, but also whatever American investigators might be able to locate him and rescue him. When he called the State Department, his heart sinks as he is put on hold. Surely there's nothing worse than being put on hold when you've been buried alive and your oxygen supply is dwindling. 

The entirety of "Buried," every second of it, takes place inside that coffin. The coffin in a little larger than a traditional burial box, so director Cortés and cinematographer Eduard Grau find many novel, creative ways to shoot the action. "Buried" seems to take place mostly in real time, 95 minutes of panic. 

Because of the limited setting, "Buried" could have been filmed anywhere. The director could have come to Reynolds' house and filmed in a dark bedroom, for all we know. To Reynolds' annoyance, however, Cortés chose to shoot the film in his native Spain, requiring the Canadian leading man to travel overseas. At this year's TIFF (as covered by EW), Reynolds' revealed his four-letter response to the director. To this day, Reynolds still doesn't know why Cortés insisted on shooting in Spain, and didn't relocate to where his star lived. 

Reynolds also revealed that Cortés wanted to do an entire week of rehearsals, which would have forced the actor to stay locked in a box for seven additional days. "Buried," for the record, was shot in Barcelona over the course of 16 days, which is a long time to be locked up. Reynolds felt that extra rehearsal would not help the matter, as he didn't really have to learn a lot of blocking, and the film's lighting setups wouldn't be too complex. "Buried" is more like a play than a film. In fact, when Cortes suggested an extra week of rehearsals, Reynolds very clearly told him, "Go f*** yourself." He continued by saying:

"Because you can't rehearse that, you've just got to believe it. If I believe it, you'll believe it, and we go. That's what we did. [...] I still, to this day, don't know why we shot it in Barcelona, but we did. I was like, this could've been shot in my living room. I'm happy to host!"

"Buried" was made for only $2 million, but still did very poorly in the United States. It received a limited release, and only made about $1 million back. Luckily, the film received more attention overseas, eventually earning $21.3 million overall. Thanks to its poor performance domestically, however, it's considered a bomb. Reynolds mentioned that he was ultimately proud of what he didn't but also that he never wants to do anything like it ever again. Despite its lack of American success, "Buried" was well-liked by certain critics. Roger Ebert praised its bleak panic and creativity in small spaces. It's a very hopeless film, involving fear and death and little else, but it's gripping.