Dark, Spooky, and actually all right

Rating: 9/10 (9 July 2009)

The movie "Knowing" is a well-told, intriguing, and at times, spooky story. The acting is on-par with the modern cinematic experience. There is action, wonder, intensity, and a wonderful sense of foreboding throughout. I liked it and it kept my interest. I had a feeling where it was going, but I was enjoying the journey to get there. There was never a moment where I thought, "Why is he doing that???" Nicolas Cage does what he's best at and it kinda works. The kids aren't too annoying.
However, from some of the comments I have read here, I would have believed this to be yet another bad Hollywood (despite being filmed almost entirely in Melbourne, Australia) popcorn flick.
phantasmagoric-1 from United Kingdom writes: "... aliens! The second worst cop out in history ..." How are aliens in any way a close second to, '... and then I awoke, and it was all a dream'? I don't understand why a movie cannot contain that particular story element? Who decided that it's off-limits? And when? (You do realize that Transformers are aliens, right?) Personally, I blame Steven Spielberg, Star Trek, Star Wars, and all those 50's science fiction movies. They really cornered the market, and paved the way for alien-free cinema.
This, in spite of the fact that the whole movie had the premise seeded throughout. This comment suggests that the aliens just popped up at minute 120 of a 2-hour film, and proverbially saved the day.
prezidanto from United States writes: "I've been reading science fiction for 30 years." Really? Well, I've been reading SF for 30 years too, and I've read many books with similar themes throughout those 30 years. There was nothing in this movie that validates this reviewer's comment, "'Thought-provoking' only in the sense that if you start thinking about it, you'll be astounded at how little sense in makes, and how much thinking you have to do to force any of it to work." The movie made complete sense. Yes, there is some thinking involved. A good story compels us to do that.
clement-reber from Switzerland writes that the movie is merely propaganda for Scientology. Well done genius. Now everyone's Googling the Scientology websites to find out where to sign up. Oh, hold on. They're not. Even if there is a Scientology angle to the film (and Hubbard did not invent the premise being told in this story... not even close), it doesn't work unless you put the phone number up on the screen, silly.
valonpimeys from Finland wants to know how a girl in 1959 could write down GPS coordinates... that are from the future. It's hardly worth my time pointing out such ridiculous lack of understanding. That's aside from the fact that GPS coordinates are simply latitude and longitude - a system that is way older than the 50's.
How about the one about the numbers, and how they're never explained. What? Never. Explained? Did some of you fall asleep? Did you turn your brains off, or were you texting on your phone through the whole movie?
So, now I get down to my review of the reviewers. The simple question that I want answered is this: Does anyone actually know anything about the movies they go and see? Or do they just blindly walk into a cinema based on the scenes of fire and destruction they saw in the trailer. It's obvious to me that a good many of the people that saw this movie rated it based on some misguided notion that it didn't play out how they expected.
Does anyone actually know how to be entertained these days? Not enough car chases and guns? It's my firm belief that people are getting stupider as time goes on, that unless a movie has a simple A-B-C plot then they don't know what's going on. Still more, in a tiresome attempt to relive the awe that followed their watching of "The Sixth Sense" refuse to accept a story that doesn't have a 'twisty' ending. How many films with tiresome plot-twists do you need to see before you realize that there just aren't that many great ideas left in the world. M. Night Shyamalan has proved that to be true on more than one occasion.
You're three quarters of the way through the movie, after every prediction comes to pass as written, and you still can't accept that John Koestler has no power to change anything. I mean, how dumb do you have to be to still be waiting for the big tangential plot-twist at that point. And did you wipe the constant appearance of the spooky aliens from your mind?
Were the constant references to the sun not a big enough clue? Didn't you understand soon enough that this wasn't a horror movie? That the occult wasn't being featured here? prezidanto from United States makes my point quite aptly when he asks: "How come the aliens can't find *some* way to communicate with people?" Well, big surprise for those of you who don't understand the obvious. They did. But, and here's the kick in the pants for you folks, even if they hadn't at all, or even if they'd phoned up the President himself, or appeared on the Today show with flashing neon underpants that spelled out "The End Is Nigh", they couldn't stop the inevitable from happening. And that, my children, was the point of the whole movie.