I’m not sure what disappoints me the most about Knowing, the fact that Alex Proyas made a bad film or the fact that this is another in a string of really bad Nicolas Cage films. It boils down to this: I sat through all 120 minutes of the film and left the theater with no idea what I just saw. Here’s what I want you to do, take the movie genres Sci-Fi, Suspense, Horror, Disaster, Thriller, Mystery, Father-Son-Dealing-With-Loss and put them all up on a dart board. Now, imagine director Alex Proyas throwing a dart every fifteen minutes and changing the film, for no reason, to whatever genre is hit. Also, every time there is a genre change, he must also change the underlying thematic tone to either supernatural, spiritual or scientific. That’s how scattered this film looks and feels. Things happen for no reason, plot points are focused and built up around specific characters only to end up not having anything to do with them at all and the ending…well, pointless would certainly describe it. At one point, Cage’s character asks why he was given the film’s MacGuffin if there wasn’t a way he could prevent the disasters it predicts. You will be asking that very same question as that whole major plot point just serves to trot us along from one special effects showcase to another and sort of runs out of steam before the final act. I think. Like I said, it’s all very confusing. Not in a Donnie Darko, Until The End Of The World kind of way, but more in an unintentionally Plan 9 From Outer Space way.
Alex Proyas is a favorite director of mine. I love The Crow (for very personal reasons, but it’s still a great film), adore Dark City, most especially the recently released Director’s Cut, and I think I, Robot isn’t the bad film everyone keeps wanting it to be. I truly don’t know what he was going for here. It’s almost like he was trying to make a M. Night Shyamalan film, or at least a caricature of one. I can be forgiving when a favorite director stumbles a little on a film, but this is staggering drunkenly out a four story window. Proyas also chooses to painfully lead the audience by the nose; it’s quickly obvious nothing supernaturally scary happens in the daytime (just the disasters so that every penny spent on the SFX shows up clearly on screen), the horror stuff reserved for the dark of night. And don’t worry, the music will deafeningly let you know when something is a revelation or supposed to be spooky. Yet he’ll throw thematic and tonal changes at you faster than Robin Williams goes through one-liners and for no discernible reason other than he can’t make up his mind what kind of film he’s making. This is also the film that I had hoped would redeem Nicolas Cage in my eyes. Ever since he ruined Brian De Palma’s Snake Eyes I’ve felt his career has hit rock bottom. Knowing sounded promising and I fully expected Proyas being capable of directing Cage in a moderately decent way. Instead, we just get a somber, listless performance, punctuated with moments of H.I. McDunnough-like outbursts. If you’re a Nicolas Cage fan you’ll just want to bypass this and re-watch Leaving Las Vegas. Trust me, you’ll feel better.
Bottom line, if you got interested in this film due to the trailer, you will not be getting the product as advertised. I had the choice between seeing this or The Great Buck Howard. I chose poorly. I only hope my experience will serve as a warning to you so that you may make the wiser choice.
