Movie Review (Some Spoilers)
Cris Johnson played by Nicolas Cage is a man that can predict the future, but only 2
minutes ahead into the future as it relates to him. He makes a
living using his ability for magic tricks, and winning a little from
casinos. This works out ok until he sees a man with a gun shoot two
people in a casino and while trying to stop him, he ends up looking
like a mad man with a gun. While he is able to easily escape the
situation, the government's attention is ignited toward him
believing he can be used to help find a nuclear bomb. The bad guys
get wind of this and come after him as well.
Jessica Biel plays his new girlfriend and gives
Cris a ride out to Arizona to avoid capture only she knows nothing
about the entire scenario going on around her. Her character
Elizabeth 'Liz' Cooper somehow enables Cris to see out into the
future a much greater distance, and enables him to help out the
government with the terrorist or so it seems.
Now for all intents and purposes, I was really
digging this movie. It had aspects of time travel, great action,
uniquely envisioned concept of an old idea as seeing into the
future, lots of great effects. I was not bored I'll give you that
much, but the ending left me hanging. It was almost like they hoped
for a sequel so they decided to not end it completely. Not wanting
to give away the whole thing, I'll just say it kept getting better
and better, and right up to the end I was really expecting a nice
pay off, and then wham it was like the movie got cut off. It's like
watching TV and the cable or satellite goes out before the end of a
show. While the movie had cool surprising moments, unfortunately the
most surprising was the timing of the end.
I'd give this movie a 10, but thanks to the
abrupt ending I have to take it back down to 6.5. At least I can say
this, it was tons better than Cage's last movie
Wicker Man, not as good as
Ghost Rider, but much more up to par.
Trivia:
In the scene where Chris is zapping through TV channels, he stops at
one showing the movie Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop
Worrying and Love the Bomb (1964). Leaving it on for the FBI to
listen to. The plot of “Dr. Strangelove” is about a rogue general
attempting to start a nuclear holocaust with a wayward nuke. An
obvious reference to the nuke in the movie “Next”. |
