Slowly builds to an unexpected end...pure Hollywood stuff

Rating: 6/10 (6 September 2009)

Knowing (2009)
Slowly builds to an unexpected end...pure Hollywood stuff
Knowing is terrific and terrifying, and it has some of the best disaster effects you'll ever see. But it's not brilliant or even original, though the plot has its own turns and specifics to make it distinctive. It uses so many familiar sci-fi/thriller/horror tricks to shock us and make us pay attention, you might feel as manipulated, and helpless, as I did, but you might also get swept along and have a great time.
The plot, which I have a rule against describing, is more crucial to the development of the action than many movies. Nicolas Cage is really fine as the lead scientist/dad, and in a very usual Cage kind of way. If you like him (which I do), I'd say you'll like the movie. The kids hearing voices and the building sense of doom are necessary and entertaining--if that's not too breezy a word for a heavy heavy story. Because it is all dependent on this 50 year old prophesy, and about how to decode it, and then, alas, what the heck to do about it. In some ways it devolves into a standard catastrophe scenario, with Cage holding his end of the stick very well. The scientist he plays faces his atheism and watches it evaporate with dry resistance, very nicely.
The really disappointing gripe is how poorly the concept is handled in terms of science and math and general likelihood. The numerology just isn't convincing. In some ways it's so simple and historically based, it's dull (and excessive) once you get the point. But having the information and then running around in a frenzy isn't exactly what you might expect. Furthermore, the solar flare idea is conceivable, but not presenting with a kind of scientific reasonableness that would give the movie credibility. Even the way the trailer has been abandoned for years and never vandalized doesn't match my experience of the back woods.
But then, maybe it just operates as a what-if kind of fantasy, with a holy-cow ending that will gag the most dreamy-eyed of you. They could have left the last minute off entirely...but you might disagree completely. If you see it on a plane (not likely) or in a motel, it's perfect distraction material, gripping and exciting. The first big disaster (you'll see) is so realistic it gives me goosebumps remembering it.