He knows!
Directed by Alex Proyas
Summit Entertainment, 2009
By Rachel West
There are a few things that I’d be better off not knowing. One of which is the outcome of the movie Knowing, the plot and climax of which is as thin as Nicolas Cage’s hairline.
Always up for a trashy sci-fi action movie, and an admitted fan of Cage’s over-the-top performances and recent string of bafflingly terrible action flicks, I thought Knowing would fall into the “so bad it’s good” category. Unfortunately, Knowing is the sort of movie that’s so bad it’s… still bad.
Despite the lacklustre title, the film has a promising, albeit ludicrous, premise: in commemoration of the opening of a new elementary school in 1959, the school children each drew a picture of what they thought the future would look like to be placed in a time capsule for 50 years. When the time capsule is opened in 2008, young Caleb is handed an envelope from the past. Instead of a picture of rocket ships and flying cars, Caleb’s time capsule drawing is a seemingly random page filled with numbers drawn by a disturbed child named Lucinda.
When Caleb’s astrophysicist dad John (Nicolas Cage) takes a look at the numbers, he discovers that each numbered sequence represents a major disaster from the past 50 years. With the dates matching everything from fatal fires, 9/11 and plane crashes, there are three disasters yet to occur as John races to stop the impending catastrophes.
Thrown into this mix is Diana (Rose Byrne), the daughter of Lucinda, and Diana’s daughter, Abby. Abby, like Caleb, hears scrambled voices, inaudible to adults. When Diana and John unite, they discover that their children are the key to the mystery.
Cage creepier than house?
With a plot like that, Knowing should be filled with action, explosions, and some white-knuckled moments of suspense. But this is not the case. The plot moves at glacial speed and takes forever to gain any momentum. Instead, the film is weighed down by moody shots of the foreboding woods, John looking pensive, and young Caleb (Chandler Canterbury) perfecting his Children of the Corn vacant stare.
Knowing is not able to sustain its too few moments of suspense, and the audience is able to telegraph what the mysterious numbers represent long before the characters on screen. The dialogue reads like a bland sci-fi paperback with gems like, “It’s going to get a lot worse before it gets any better,” delivered by Nic Cage in a forcedly purposeful way.
The film does provide a few chilling moments in the form of the cloaked strangers or “Whisperers” as they are referred to in the film, who, like all creepy strangers, enjoy hanging out in the woods, shrouded in fog, staring into people’s houses, but the entire film is weighed down by its over-earnestness. Everything is dire. There is no hope for any of us. Although the film is bad, there are some spectacular special effects sequences involving a plane crash and a subway disaster that will make you think twice about boarding the TTC. Director Alex Proyas is no slouch when it comes to big budget special effects and dark subject matter. He’s studied at the school of Michael Bay and has delivered results in I, Robot, Dark City, and The Crow. Knowing seems like a walk in the park for him.
And of course, like any bad sci-fi flick, aliens must be to blame. Aliens have become the scapegoat for all mysterious happenings on earth. When strange occurrences can’t be blamed on the government, the only logical conclusion is that some not-so-friendly little green men are responsible. By pointing the finger at aliens for all of earth’s problems, any preposterous plot points that have yet to be wrapped up can simply be directed back onto the otherworldly visitors.
These aren’t even futuristic or frightening aliens: they look like fair-haired and skinned Nordic gods, with vacant eyes and mouths full of….light. They don’t have any weapons, and when not hanging out in the fog, whispering to kids, they spend their free time flying around in artichoke-like spaceships. Not exactly scary stuff.
While Knowing isn’t a total waste of time- it does provide quite a few unintentional laughs and viewers will be amused by counting the number of plot holes- it’s certainly one of the crown jewels in Nicolas Cage’s recent string of bombs. There is just something about a guy who continuously outdoes himself in increasingly crazily horrible films. Who reads a script for a film called Bangkok Dangerous and thinks it’ll be good? Nicolas Cage. He’s untouchable despite the terrible choices he has made as of late, as Knowing’s top spot at the North American box office proves.
Knowing won’t leave you wanting more, and you’re certainly better off not knowing what new lows Cage has sunk to.
Awesome review. I can’t remember the last film with Cage that I saw that I thought was decent.