Knowing

I avoided Knowing because of Rotten Tomatoes. Well, turns out that lovely, useful aggregate of movie reviews isn't always lovely or useful.

Roger Ebert, on the other hand, is much more dependable. Not that I always agree with him, but he's not the fickle masses. He's an extremely intelligent critic--biased, unique, and personal. And, I often do agree with him. About a week ago, he posted a list of movies to which he gave 3 1/2 or 4 star reviews. Can you guess one of the films that received four stars from this particular critic?

His review was downright glowing. So, of course, I reconsidered. Watched it this past Saturday night.

I loved it. There were minor issues with the writing, but nothing too terrible. And there were some plot holes and assumptions that could have been annoying if I'd strained at them. But what dwarfed all of that was how incredibly ambitious this film was. This ambition that so impressed me manifested itself in two ways:

1) The story. This narrative was willing to go places and say things that I don't normally expect filmmakers to have the guts to go. It had BIG things to show, and it didn't pull punches. Any film that tackles the apocalypse, God, faith, and aliens all in the same text deserves at least a modicum of respect.

2) The special effects. This was a gorgeously shot film, and the bangs were sophisticated, thrilling, and moving. I was constantly surprised by where the really explosive effects were placed. It didn't open with some thrilling sequence, and never did the film rely on the bells and whistles of FX to arbitrarily spice up an inherently dull sequence. Nor were the grandest and most overwhelming sequences reserved for the climax, which was shocking. The story was finished before we got to see the stuff that probably took the longest for those industry computers to render--one of the most spectacular special effects sequences I've ever seen was reserved for the denouement. Ambitious and risky. Phew.

The performances were all better-than-necessary. We don't typically expect really profound acting from our crazy sci-fi thriller/disaster movies. But this one was a whole lot more emotionally spot-on than it should have been.

I guess I can best sum up my experience by saying I'm convinced once again that one of the most pleasant ways to receive a film is to go in with low expectations and be proven wrong on almost every point. So go ahead, read some of the reviews that caused Rotten Tomatoes to squeeze out a shameful 14% for this movie. Then go watch it. It's pretty grand.