It is often said that a film is only as good as its actors and, in Knowing's case, this saying proves to be true. Cage's performance, while touching at times, was mainly gloopy and underwhelming; the film itself, which started out rather promising, gradually deteriorated into an ending which was no better. The only satisfaction I got from the last 10 minutes was that, had the world in fact been destroyed in a blistering solar flare, the makers of this film would burn with it. Unfortunately, the graphics weren't convincing enough to make me fully believe this, so my impatience for the closing credits grew.

I rented the film happily anticipating a thrilling action film, willing to sit through Cage's acting so long as I would be rewarded with a clever storyline and an exciting, fulfilling ending in which he saves the world from imminent destruction and, for the first half of the film, I believed this would be the case. Knowing did provide a certain amount of thrills during the first hour; good moments being when Cage discovers how the codes match up to each major disaster the world has undergone, and then his trying to prevent the next two events listed from happening. However, from the moment one of the eerily long-headed men (who had been appearing at various moments throughout the film) opens his gaping mouth at Cage as if he were some kind of ghostly goldfish, light pouring out of his great orifice, my heart sank. The film had transformed from thrilling and suspenseful into a movie that was laughable at best.

The movie then proceeded to tell us, the bewildered, confused and - in my case - amused audience, that the world was to be devoured by a solar flare and everyone would die. Thus, the plot descended into a steaming pile of lunacy. Among the unanswered questions of the plot were why it was that Cage's child in particular was 'chosen' to continue the human race - a ghastly decision, in my opinio;, did the long-headed aliens not notice how annoying the boy was? - what the importance of the black stones (handed out like business cards by our ovular friends) was, why, out of all the animals in the world, they chose to bring rabbits with them and why Cage wasn't allowed to come with his son to the next planet.

But, in the end, never mind: I think I'm better off not Knowing.