Nicholas Cage's last few films have made me laugh out loud, and not because they were intentionally funny. But what I saw from Knowing left me breathless, disturbed, and, maybe, terrified. And it's not because the special effects were lame (they were) or because the movie was slow (it was) but because the movie's vision of the future, while distorted, has reflective elements of an apocalyptic end-of-days scenario. And I just couldn't find the hope.

Watching the movie, and even reading through many of the responses of the director, Ryne Douglas Pearson, I found myself immensely unsatisfied. While I understand that Pearson has a Catholic background (and I've recently raved about the Catholic-influenced fiction, Doubt) I found some disturbing "leaps" in Knowing that I don't think are justifiably explained or dealt with to my satisfaction. It's not a bad movie, though, and it's not without faith. Who knows, maybe I just didn't like what I found reflected back there.

Cage's Professor Koestler is an atheist who continues to struggle with the death of his wife, and the mother of his son, Caleb (Chandler Canterbury). After a time capsule gets opened, we find that Caleb is one of the few people who can hear the Whisper People/Strangers. We've already witnessed a small girl go crazy a generation earlier in the introductory prelude, and there's always the potential that Caleb will, too. But soon, "I don't believe in anything" Koestler ends up realizing that the numbers his son ends up "hearing" are all part of a warning about natural and manmade disasters from the past century.

Fastforward to the end of the story (major spoilers) and we discover that the Whisper People are there to save the children, but not Koestler senior. And not "everyone else." So, what we're left with, as the world burns, is an alien race who saves two children (a boy and a girl) and creates a new Eden on a different planet after absolute world destruction. Of course, there's a poignant moment between Koestler and his pastor father, where the father says something like, "this isn't the end," and Koestler (the middle) says, "I know." So, we're supposed to recognize that the professor is now a person of faith, having seen the way the world goes down.

So Koestler believes in what, exactly? Aliens abduct the children and "reboot" the world. Is that really what we see about the end of this world and the beginning of the next? It seems like that's more "karma reality," where people are reborn. Or maybe it's an Old Testament version, with spaceships instead of arks, as a present day Adam and Eve become Noah (they're pure; they actually listen to the message) and become something better. But what future life, what heaven, does that allow for the adults who are destroyed? And how does that impact the faith of Professor Koestler's father, and the sparing of those who already believe?

So, don't consider me a Knowing "hater," or disbeliever, just a skeptic. I don't think the analogy is perfect here, or even flawed, but instead, distorted. So, I'd preach caution on this one, in reading in too much about faith, and ask, "Where's the hope?"