There has been, in the history of cinema so far, no other movie that has caused my innards to want to burst out from my body and strangle its creators than 'Knowing'.
Some would retort: "Come on, it couldn't have been as bad as Batman & Robin! Or Indy 4!" Well, to that I tell you this. Batman & Robin was shit from the first two minutes of film. I stayed in the cinema to see whether it could get any better and was sadly mistaken. Even the close-up of Alicia Silverstone's bum couldn't make it better, but from the moment the movie started, it was shit. And Indy 4 is bad predominantly because it has three other well made movies to live up to and just flat out couldn't.
'Knowing' is bad because for three quarters of the film it's actually good. Sure, the CGI looks like the product of a first year student in animation, and if it was, that student should be applauded and his or her skills nurtured but no, this was a Hollywood film at a time where CGI has come a long way since the Nintendo 64 looking graphics of 'Species'. Regardless of this fact, the story still grips because it kicks off with an interesting premise and keeps building up on it: a series of numbers are found in a time capsule, each group of numbers signifying the date of an event that will cause the death of a number of people, the amount of people that will die and the coordinates of the location where the event will take place - 9/11, hurricane Katrina, etc, all leading up to present day. Three dates are of the future, and it's up to Nicolas Cage to figure out whether or not he can stop these events from happening and what it all has to do with him.The kicker? The last date signifies the end of the world.
Sounds interesting, right? Pretty good so far. And whilst many in the world may not like the Cage-meister, he's done a lot of good movies such as 'Leaving Las Vegas' and 'Adaptation as well as flicks that I dig even though some may think they're wrong and cheesy like 'Con Air'.
Fuck you. The 'bunny in the box' moment is a landmark in action cinema.
Since it's a Hollywood Cage flick, certain things are required, such as running...
...and doing the classic Cage pose.
But as far as I'm concerned, that's ok. The bad CGI is ok. The story gripped me and Kitty and I assume Col. Kurtz/Papa Bear was at least mildly interested. Hell, even the fact that the projectionist fucked up causing the screen to blur a bit in the middle didn't bug me after a while even though we came to watch the movie specifically to see how a flick shot on the RED camera looked like blown up to 35mm. It didn't bug me because the story seemed very, very interesting. Especially when you pepper the flick with the random strangeness of creepy blonde trenchcoat guys.
The guys were reminscent of the director's previous work, 'Dark City'. Yes, that's right, ladies and gents, it's directed by Alex Proyas, who also brought us 'The Crow'. How could this movie be bad?
Wait for it.
As the movie progresses and heads to the end of the world, questions started popping up in the movie that, for a moment, I thought was the basis of the whole flick: "can one man change his destiny, or the destiny of others? Is the future set in stone? Is there a purpose to existence, to life?"
If it dealt with these questions, I wouldn't be writing this post.
The movie continues and it really looks like there's no way Cage can save the planet, which makes it even more interesting: by the third act, the key to saving the world should have popped up already, but it doesn't - earth will go boom, nothing you can do. There's a solar flare coming and we're more fucked than a brontosaurus looking up in the sky and said, "damn, that's a big rock coming towards us".
(Before any dinosaur experts say anything, let me be the first to admit that I cannot for the life of me remember what species of dinosaur existed when they went extinct. I don't know the periods except for cretaceous and only because it sounds cool.)
Now, before I continue, let me say this: THIS IS A BIG SPOILER. If you really want to see the movie and don't want to know what the big twist is, read something else because the twist is the reason I'm writing this in the first place, to warn the world of its coming so that no one need never experience the horrors I experienced at three o' clock in the morning in a poorly proejcted cinema. If you really want to experience it yourself, close this and go buy a ticket but I'm warning you. This movie is the fucking video from 'The Ring'.
Still with me? Very good. So yeah: the world's gonna end. No hope in sight. Meanwhile, Cage's son and the daughter of this girl Cage meets at some point but gets runover by a truck are being called by some unknown force tied to the blonde trenchcoat mafia that's been acting all spooky. Cage follows them. The kids say they've been chosen to follow them to safety. Cage looks up in his trademark Cage way...
...to discover a spaceship above him.
That's right. A fucking spaceship. From numerology and determinism to fucking Close Encounters. Close Encounters was about aliens, for fucks sake. Where the fuck did these guys come from?
But are they really aliens? God only knows, and that statement couldn't be more true, because that spaceship looks like some kind of futuristic star and the blonde guys turn into glowing aliens, humanoid shapes... with futuristic glowing angel wings.
Yes, you read that right.
The kids bring a rabbit each with them, because the aliens/angels said they could. One rabbit each. I wonder if the boy picked a male and the girl picked a female. I wonder, indeed.
Then the 'aliens' fly off as Nicolas Cage stirkes a pose:
Wait for it.
As the movie progresses and heads to the end of the world, questions started popping up in the movie that, for a moment, I thought was the basis of the whole flick: "can one man change his destiny, or the destiny of others? Is the future set in stone? Is there a purpose to existence, to life?"
If it dealt with these questions, I wouldn't be writing this post.
The movie continues and it really looks like there's no way Cage can save the planet, which makes it even more interesting: by the third act, the key to saving the world should have popped up already, but it doesn't - earth will go boom, nothing you can do. There's a solar flare coming and we're more fucked than a brontosaurus looking up in the sky and said, "damn, that's a big rock coming towards us".
(Before any dinosaur experts say anything, let me be the first to admit that I cannot for the life of me remember what species of dinosaur existed when they went extinct. I don't know the periods except for cretaceous and only because it sounds cool.)
Now, before I continue, let me say this: THIS IS A BIG SPOILER. If you really want to see the movie and don't want to know what the big twist is, read something else because the twist is the reason I'm writing this in the first place, to warn the world of its coming so that no one need never experience the horrors I experienced at three o' clock in the morning in a poorly proejcted cinema. If you really want to experience it yourself, close this and go buy a ticket but I'm warning you. This movie is the fucking video from 'The Ring'.
Still with me? Very good. So yeah: the world's gonna end. No hope in sight. Meanwhile, Cage's son and the daughter of this girl Cage meets at some point but gets runover by a truck are being called by some unknown force tied to the blonde trenchcoat mafia that's been acting all spooky. Cage follows them. The kids say they've been chosen to follow them to safety. Cage looks up in his trademark Cage way...
...to discover a spaceship above him.
That's right. A fucking spaceship. From numerology and determinism to fucking Close Encounters. Close Encounters was about aliens, for fucks sake. Where the fuck did these guys come from?
But are they really aliens? God only knows, and that statement couldn't be more true, because that spaceship looks like some kind of futuristic star and the blonde guys turn into glowing aliens, humanoid shapes... with futuristic glowing angel wings.
Yes, you read that right.
The kids bring a rabbit each with them, because the aliens/angels said they could. One rabbit each. I wonder if the boy picked a male and the girl picked a female. I wonder, indeed.
Then the 'aliens' fly off as Nicolas Cage stirkes a pose:
Now, by this point I was ready to leave the cinema, as was Kitty and Col. Kurtz, but something inside us was curious to see how much more worse it could be.
And boy, does it get worse.
As Cage drives off to see his estranged parents who he had a fight with for the longest time, he drives through a city in... well, mild chaos at best. I dunno about you, but if the sun's out of control and there's a heatwave and the world's gonna end the last thing I'm gonna do is light a fucking bonfire.
Somehow, Cage gets through the crowds by driving in slow-motion and doesn't get stopped at any point. He walks in and sees his sister, and hugs her. He then hugs his mother and finally, his father, who's a pastor. The father says, "this isn't the end, my son," and Cage replies,
"I know".
Then they all hug and the world burns.
Cut to wheat - it's the random planet the 'aliens' have dropped the kids off, except they've also decided to give them new clothes made out of hemp and look like something from a hippy commune. The children run through the wheat towards something. The camera pulls out to reveal what they run towards and it turns out to be...
...a big ass, biblical looking tree. That glows.
So, in a nutshell, when the world ends, don't worry - think of God and feel safe in the knowledge that you'll be with your loved ones once again in Heaven when Armegeddon comes a calling, and the chosen few will be taken by angels onto a bright star together with two of their favorite furry creatures whereupon they will be dropped off at the Garden of Eden dressed like nature-loving-pot-heads. After all that build up of tension, all that intrigue and wonder, after all that, do you really, honestly, expect me to rejoice when this, THIS is the fucking twist ending? This movie should've been called the fucking Rapture!
Now, don't get me wrong: I am not, in any way, shape or form, trying to diss the Christian religion in any of it's forms, be it Catholic, Protestant, Presbytarian, Methodist, Calivinist, Born Again or any other form. To me religion is a good thing in any shape or form as long as it is not taken to extreme or used for one's own agenda (which happens way too much and pretty much given religion in any form a bad name). There is nothing wrong with Christianity, nor is there anything wrong with putting Christianic symbolism or using a film as an allegory for one's own beliefs. Religion can be found as the subtext of so many films. Scorcese's works are obviously driven by his own Catholic beliefs. Alex Proyas himself has Christian symbolism in subtext in almost all his works (except maybe 'Garage Days'). There's nothing wrong with any of that.
But there is certainly something wrong with using it as your third act fucking twist, and there is something definitely wrong with being so obvious in one's supposed subtext that it feels like the filmmaker is literally trying to shove his belief system down the throats of the viewers.
Why not just make a fucking movie about the End of Days, about Armageddon? Sure, those titles are taken, but you could call it something else! Why not just make a movie about those chapters of the bible as opposed to trying to 'hide' it within a mainstream movie with the subtlety of a six foot seven rapist with his engorged 17 inch hard-on tapping you on the shoulder with one finger and pointing to his cock with the other and saying, "I am going to stick this in your butt against your will".
There's nothing wrong with biblical movies. Biblical movies have been around since the birth of cinema - Ben Hur, the Ten Commandments, The Passion of The Christ - and there's never been anything wrong with that, so why this monstrosity?
And you know what the worst part is, folks? It's three day weekend opening gross was USD$24.8 million. It's the number one box office hit of the weekend, out-doing the business of movies such as Watchmen, Coraline and Slumdog Millionaire. Don't believe me? Here's the link.
I don't know what to say about Hollywood now. I wouldn't complain so much if the other not-so-mainstream movies made it to our big screens in this country but they don't. I had to watch the Wrestler on DVD and I'm glad I watched Slumdog on DVD because I heard it was censored on the big screen. I want to watch a good movie in the cinema for once this year with Kitty and both times we've been thoroughly dissapointed.
I swear, if Wolverine or Star Trek suck I don't think I'll be going to the cinema again for a while.
And boy, does it get worse.
As Cage drives off to see his estranged parents who he had a fight with for the longest time, he drives through a city in... well, mild chaos at best. I dunno about you, but if the sun's out of control and there's a heatwave and the world's gonna end the last thing I'm gonna do is light a fucking bonfire.
Somehow, Cage gets through the crowds by driving in slow-motion and doesn't get stopped at any point. He walks in and sees his sister, and hugs her. He then hugs his mother and finally, his father, who's a pastor. The father says, "this isn't the end, my son," and Cage replies,
"I know".
Then they all hug and the world burns.
Cut to wheat - it's the random planet the 'aliens' have dropped the kids off, except they've also decided to give them new clothes made out of hemp and look like something from a hippy commune. The children run through the wheat towards something. The camera pulls out to reveal what they run towards and it turns out to be...
...a big ass, biblical looking tree. That glows.
So, in a nutshell, when the world ends, don't worry - think of God and feel safe in the knowledge that you'll be with your loved ones once again in Heaven when Armegeddon comes a calling, and the chosen few will be taken by angels onto a bright star together with two of their favorite furry creatures whereupon they will be dropped off at the Garden of Eden dressed like nature-loving-pot-heads. After all that build up of tension, all that intrigue and wonder, after all that, do you really, honestly, expect me to rejoice when this, THIS is the fucking twist ending? This movie should've been called the fucking Rapture!
Now, don't get me wrong: I am not, in any way, shape or form, trying to diss the Christian religion in any of it's forms, be it Catholic, Protestant, Presbytarian, Methodist, Calivinist, Born Again or any other form. To me religion is a good thing in any shape or form as long as it is not taken to extreme or used for one's own agenda (which happens way too much and pretty much given religion in any form a bad name). There is nothing wrong with Christianity, nor is there anything wrong with putting Christianic symbolism or using a film as an allegory for one's own beliefs. Religion can be found as the subtext of so many films. Scorcese's works are obviously driven by his own Catholic beliefs. Alex Proyas himself has Christian symbolism in subtext in almost all his works (except maybe 'Garage Days'). There's nothing wrong with any of that.
But there is certainly something wrong with using it as your third act fucking twist, and there is something definitely wrong with being so obvious in one's supposed subtext that it feels like the filmmaker is literally trying to shove his belief system down the throats of the viewers.
Why not just make a fucking movie about the End of Days, about Armageddon? Sure, those titles are taken, but you could call it something else! Why not just make a movie about those chapters of the bible as opposed to trying to 'hide' it within a mainstream movie with the subtlety of a six foot seven rapist with his engorged 17 inch hard-on tapping you on the shoulder with one finger and pointing to his cock with the other and saying, "I am going to stick this in your butt against your will".
There's nothing wrong with biblical movies. Biblical movies have been around since the birth of cinema - Ben Hur, the Ten Commandments, The Passion of The Christ - and there's never been anything wrong with that, so why this monstrosity?
And you know what the worst part is, folks? It's three day weekend opening gross was USD$24.8 million. It's the number one box office hit of the weekend, out-doing the business of movies such as Watchmen, Coraline and Slumdog Millionaire. Don't believe me? Here's the link.
I don't know what to say about Hollywood now. I wouldn't complain so much if the other not-so-mainstream movies made it to our big screens in this country but they don't. I had to watch the Wrestler on DVD and I'm glad I watched Slumdog on DVD because I heard it was censored on the big screen. I want to watch a good movie in the cinema for once this year with Kitty and both times we've been thoroughly dissapointed.
I swear, if Wolverine or Star Trek suck I don't think I'll be going to the cinema again for a while.
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