Knowing (2009)

Starring Nicholas Cage.

The story begins with a young girl in 1959 being asked by her school teacher to create a picture, individually along with the other kids in the class, which will be put into a time capsule, buried underground, and then said capsule will be opened in 2009.  However, the girl goes all psycho-spooky and writes all over her page (both sides) a load of random numbers.  She is then caught later scratching more numbers onto a door and is found by her freaked-out (rightly so!) teacher.

Flashforward to 2009 where Nicholas Cage and his elongated sentences act as a professor in a college, teaching his students all about determination and randomness.  Interesting theories are batted about and Cage confesses to being a non-believer in determination.  Then his son, coincidentally at the school which is opening the time capsule, is given an envelope to open.  Exciting stuff from 50 years ago.  However, he is devasated (rightly so, again!) to find he does not have a picture but this boring page of numbers.  Daddy Cage finds it in his bag and then, again coincidentally, writes the numbers 911012995 (randomly taken from the page) onto a whiteboard that he has handy(!) and quickly realises that they are 9/11/01 - 2995 (amount of people who died).  His theory on determination not existing is now shot to shreds and he is on a mission to prove that this page of numbers means something...

Throw in a few freaky blues brothers looking people who keep following Cage's son around, called the "Whisperers" (the blues brothers guys, not the son), and you've pretty much got the gist of the story.  Cage, his son, and some other woman and her daughter fight to stop the fast approaching apocolypse...

My opinion?  Worth a watch!  It's no Spielberg stuff, but it's certainly an interesting notion.  The thought of anyone predicting such devastating disasters is pretty creepy stuff - and kids always add a spooky effect, even when it's not a scary film!

4 Stars ****