Nicolas Cage, Chandler Canterbury, Rose Byrne, Adrienne Pickering, Ben Mendelsohn ...( see more  see more... ) , Terry Camilleri

A teacher (Cage) opens a time capsule that has been dug up at his son's elementary school; in it are some chilling predictions -- some that have already occurred and others that are about to -- that l...( read more  read more... )ead him to believe his family plays a role in the events that are about to unfold.

Flixster Users

50% liked it

397,238 ratings

Critics

33% liked it

160 critics

PG-13, 2 hrs. 2 min.

Directed by: Alex Proyas

Release Date: March 20, 2009

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DVD Release Date: July 7, 2009

Stats: 35,260 reviews

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Flixster Reviews (35,260)


  • December 12, 2009
    Am I missing something ? Ok the acting is abysmal and the plot predictable but it has two jaw dropping sequences and style oozing from every frame. It may lack originality ('Pi' covered similar number theories) but it at least feels fresh in its blend of apocalyptic paranoia and ...( read more)aliens. Better than 'they' say it is.
  • November 24, 2009
    OUAINNN !!! EEEE.... Quoi dire ??? Une histoire qui semble mélanger deux mondes, des effets spéciaux À CHIER! et un fin très ordinaire.

    Rien à dire de plus! C'est complètement n'importe quoi! Selon moi, ce n'était pas des dessins que les enfants avaient encapsulés, mais le scr...( read more)ipt de se film.

    Nicolas Cage à déjà mieux paru !
  • October 6, 2009
    PANTS!
  • October 5, 2009
    At some point in his career, perhaps just after the finish of Face/Off, I lost touch with NIcholas Cage. And he lost touch with me. He went from being one of my favorite actors to someone whose work I dread taking any kind of chance on seeing. It is with that same dread...( read more) that I rented this one. Much to my surprise, he has come back to himself in the movie.

    Not that this movie is spectacular. In fact, it's pretty ho-hum scifi. But Cage plays the kind of character in this one that I remember admiring him for a long time ago: he works within the script, allowing his character to drive him rather than vice-versa. In other words, he acts in this one, and he acts well. I don't know what caused him to become such an over-actor, but I'm glad he can still remember how he did it before and can still find that good acting within himself.

  • September 3, 2009
    I really, really, really wanted to like Knowing. There are so many interesting ideas that the film wants you to think about, and the disaster set pieces are incredibly staged and photographed. Nicholas Cage isn't too bad either.
    The problem is that the film juggles too many ide...( read more)as and changes tone so quickly, you're not sure if you're watching a disaster epic, an alien movie, a horror movie, or a family drama. Alex Proyas has always been a director who aims to create intelligent action films, but in Knowing, he's working on maximum overdrive.
    Instead of providing some great food for thought as to whether the universe operates at random or predetermination, Knowing leaves you not sure what to think. The final act of the picture is especially weird.
    There are also gaping holes in the story and plot points that exist specifically so that the viewer can understand what is going on. But these plot points have no reason to exist within the story. I can't really go into detail without revealing major spoilers, but if someone can explain what the point of those stones are, and why if someone knows when the world is going to end that they need to warn us about every fatal disaster that occurs leading up to that point, please, I'm all ears.
    Alas, Knowing is an admirable failure, a failure because it wants to tackle more ideas than in can handle instead of embracing a few themes and exploring the complexity of said themes. Alex Proyas has made films that are more like the latter: The Crow, I Robot (to an extent), and the masterpiece Dark City. Knowing could have joined that list, but sadly, it's an ambitious mess :(
  • January 2, 2010
    SO creepy and SO scary!!! But I LOVED the religious tidbits they added to this movie. Very creative and moving. This movie is definitely Nicolas Cage's best-acted movie. Not a movie for children. They will be scared,in the simplest sense.
  • January 1, 2010
    Interesting movie about the end of the world. Worth seeing!
  • January 1, 2010
    Knowing really looked like a good movie. But after watching it im so very dissapointed. Knowing suffered from many of the things i hate to see in movies. Predictable plot, and bad acting. (Nicolas Cage I expect better from you). This movie does however question you. Is life a ser...( read more)ies of random occuring events? or is everything pre-destined by a higher bring. I like movies that make you think even after its all over. Unfortunatly thats not enough to save Knowing. Consider this a rental and something that dosent belong in your DVD colkection.
  • December 31, 2009
    Great story but a weird ending.
  • December 31, 2009
    This movie just seemed really hokey, over dramatic and not very interesting. The lighting drove me nuts, seriously I understand the effect, but I don't think I saw Nic Cages whole face during the entire movie, it was always shadowy and dark over half of it.

Critic Reviews


March 27, 2009
Nigel Andrews, The Financial Times

The slam-bang set pieces deliver. So, with his spooked features and breathy-orotund voice, does Cage. full review

March 23, 2009
Stephanie Zacharek, Salon.com

If Alex Proyas' Knowing were reasonably entertaining -- instead of just dour, pointless and tedious -- it would be a camp classic. full review

March 20, 2009
Pete Hammond, Hollywood.com

An exciting , if not entirely plausible, sci-fi thriller. After this one, 'Next' and the 'National Treasure' movies star Nicolas Cage clearly likes 'Knowing' things before the rest of us. full review

March 20, 2009
Kurt Loder, MTV

A big creepy sci-fi thriller -- or two-thirds of one, anyway. full review

March 20, 2009
Kyle Smith, New York Post

The movie begins shameless, grows stupid and winds up silly. If the ending had less of the air of a crackpot religion and more pretentiousness, you could almost call it Shyamalanish. full review

March 20, 2009
A.O. Scott, The New York Times

The draggy, lurching two hours of Knowing will make you long for the end of the world, even as you worry that there will not be time for all your questions to be answered. full review

March 19, 2009
Claudia Puig, USA Today

If you're of a mind to believe a dreary and far-fetched thriller about numerology-crazed alien life forms, then you may find the movie mildly diverting. full review

March 19, 2009
Colin Covert, The Minneapolis Star Tribune

The resolution of the mysterious visitors' mission and John's crisis of faith feels more like an excuse to stage some hellacious cataclysms than the product of a genuine belief in anything at all. full review

March 19, 2009
Steven Rea, Philadelphia Inquirer

A weird and gloomy existential thriller. full review

March 19, 2009
Nick Schager, Slant Magazine

The promise that Alex Proyas showed with 1998's Dark City is only very sporadically evident in Knowing, the director's second sci-fi saga. full review

March 19, 2009
Roger Ebert, Chicago Sun-Times

Knowing is among the best science-fiction films I've seen -- frightening, suspenseful, intelligent and, when it needs to be, rather awesome. full review

View more Knowing reviews at RottenTomatoes.com

Comments


  • HeadlessChook16
    July 31, 2009
    It was a... weird movie. I don't really like Nicholas Cage and I didn't really like this movie. It kinda reminded me of the Simpsons episode when Homer thinks he has predicted the end of the world. I may watch it again but not for a while. Maybe If I can't remember what happened. And the cycle of confusion will begin again
  • jharhome123
    July 11, 2009
    This was a great movie if you believe in angels as our "beings" that overlook us "human beings". The universe is full of energy beings and the only way to try to explain this to humans is utilizing an outer space ship to transport us. You have to look at the movie in a different way. It is not destiny, however; all of human beings have a purpose and talents and the future time frames were that child's gift of "knowing". A must see if you open your mind.
  • rouida2001
    April 23, 2009
    Wowoooooooooooooooooo
  • bethelaw
    April 23, 2009
    kl movie but i expected more then that.. the things abt numbers and dates and location etc.. it was very good and mysterious.. i just didn't like the end :S .. it seems like something fantasy .... aliens .. i hate movies abt em ...
  • 4sauce4
    April 4, 2009
    A very good Nicolas Cage movie. One of the biggest reasons I went to see it was because of him. I love him and he is a great actor.
    Although I would like to talk about how Nicolas Cage has not aged very well and will not look good when his hair is gone, I must say the predictableness of the movie almost turned me away from it in the beginning.
    I'm normally good at reading movies anyway but this one was especially predictable.
    Not only were the commercials a big give-away but about half-way through the moive, the ending was easy to see.
    Despite the predictableness, the story itself was very sci-fi with a tough of fantasy in the whole number reading thing.
    (spoilers) It has a sad ending becuase everyone dies but lovable characters which the directers and writers used to make an easy tear-jerk at the end.
    It almost got me...almost. If I hadn't been so concerned with critisizing the movie, I would've been sucked in myself.
    All-in-all, I was moderately impressed but only
  • 4sauce4
    April 4, 2009
    because of the acting and feel of grief Nicolas gave off.
  • rosemissthing
    March 25, 2009
    this movie so sick i like it
    im n luv wit dat movie its to sick
  • liliecv1
    March 21, 2009
    wow it's all i can say :]
  • Rosepetal75
    March 20, 2009
    Astrophysics Professor John Koestler (Nicolas Cage) teaches students at MIT & Phil Beckman (Ben Mendelsohn) is a Cosmologist work @ Massachusetts Observatory in Wayford, Massachusetts.

    Diana Wayford (Rose Byrne) is the Daughter & Abby Wayford (Lara Robinson) is the Granddaughter of decreased Author Lucinda Embry-Wayford (Lara Robinson) who wrote encoded numbers in 1959 put in time capsule for 50 years earlier in 2009.

    http://rogerebert.suntimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20090318/REVIEWS/903189991
  • Rosepetal75
    March 2, 2009
    In 1958, The dedication ceremony for a new elementary school, A group of students drawing of the future in a time capsule is buried on the grounds & scheduled to be unearthed on the school's 50th Anniversary. A mysterious girl scribbles a series of random sequence numbers instead drawing on her paper to put in time capsule before it is buried. 50 years later, 1 of those students named young Caleb Koestler (Chandler Canterbury) opens the letter with the mysterious sequence of numbers falling into his possession when he hands it to his father, Professor John Koestler (Nicolas Cage) to study statistic analyzes pinpoint cryptic numbers are encoded message the precise dates, death tolls, & coordinates of every major disaster since the time capsule was buried. Professor Koestler is able to track down Author of the prophecies' Daughter: Diana Wayland (Rose Byrne), & Granddaughter Abby agree to aid in the investigation to prevent destruction on a global scale.

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Knowing Trivia


  • In what movie did Johnny Depp go crazy without knowing it?  Answer »
  • To deny our own impulses is to deny the very thing that makes us human. Throughout human history, we have been dependent on machines to survive. Fate, it seems, is not without a sense of irony. There is a difference between knowing the path and walking the path. I know kung fu.  Answer »
  • In what movie does Julia Roberts claim that "not knowing where she is when she wakes up" is an occupational hazard?   Answer »
  • (2004) "I’m not afraid of dying, I’m afraid of watching you sail away and knowing you’ll never come back. Before you came to Sparta I was a ghost. I walked and I ate and I swam in the sea, but I was just a ghost."   Answer »

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