Synopsis:
A
time capsule that has been dug up at a teacher's
son's elementary school is opened. In it
are some chilling predictions -- some that have
already occurred and others that are about to --
that lead the teacher to believe his family
plays a role in the events that are about to
unfold.
The Freak's
Rating: D+ : After the National
Treasure franchise, The Rock and now Knowing,
Cage may have permanently type cast himself.
Having zero chance at being a love interest
(lets be honest ladies), his only shot is to
grab onto every Indiana Jones-style intelligent
hero role that comes up. Harrison
Ford he is not. Having the ability to tag
himself as "Academy Award winning" is only a
slap to the face of those who have truly merited
the award, but still adds enough appeal for some
poor schlubs to buy tickets.
Knowing has an interesting storyline,
implausible as it might be. The end of the
world is unknown (of course) and therefore
intriguing to all who live within it. Will
it be an asteroid that wipes us out? Will
Jesus return and in that event end the world as
we know it? Questions and theories are
endless, so we're always open to another idea.
Knowing's major issue is that even its writers
can't seem to decided upon the stance they'll
take with their angle on the end times.
Some moments in the film the audience is given
hints, some going as far as a major character
saying "they sent someone ahead to prepare the
way". "Prepare the way" is a direct
Biblical link, so upon hearing the line I
quickly assumed we were going to see a religious
tone to the world's end as well as the
mysterious number-laden letter. Sadly, I
was off and you will be as well. In fact,
if you are able to guess the reasoning of this
film, I'll give you a bucket of popcorn on me.
It is that ridiculous.
There
is one AMAZING element to this film that keeps
it in the D range and nearly shot it into a C-.
Two action sequences in the film are extremely
well done. Human bodies are evaporated and
tossed around beautifully and a first-person
view of a catastrophe is perfectly seen in both.
These two scenes are worthy of seeing, but I'd
suggest you search YouTube for them before you
drop your $ at the box office.
Brian's Rating: C : For some reason, I queued this movie anyway, even after having read the warning review Scott gave. Well, what can I say, I was not disappointed. The movie was not very good. However, it was better than Scott makes it out to be.
Scott is right, the movie does have a strong underlying religious message. As he mentions, it is referred to in the lines of dialog he states, as well as in many other places. It is not even very subtle. I do disagree however that the writers lost their way. They carry it out to a the conclusion of a religious allegory. The thing is, they are quite clearly using this mechanism to take a deep stab at what they consider to be the ridiculousness of Christianity.
So, is the ending ridiculous and irrational? Yes. However, It think they did this on purpose to make a very clear atheistic message that all Christians are off their rocker. I would be utterly surprised if the screenwriter was not a devout atheist.
Because of the fact that it did provoke some thought in me beyond the very thin plot, I do carry this movie into the C range. The other reason is that the story concept is actually interesting, albeit executed poorly.
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