Knowing

I remember the release of Alex Proyas' 2009 film "Knowing" as one of the first times I was drawn to a film specifically because of Roger Ebert's review. By giving the apocalyptic thriller starring Nicolas Cage 4 out of 4 stars and calling it "among the best science-fiction films I've seen," Ebert deviated drastically from the overwhelmingly negative critical backlash received by the film (a 33% on Rotten Tomatoes).

And for the most part, Ebert was right. While I wouldn't deem it masterpiece level, this is an unsung oddity in 21st-century science fiction, a film that commits fiercely to its bonkers yet horrifying premise and never releases that grip. Re-visiting this work at home after nearly a decade of separation from it, I still found myself fascinated by how the thriller deals with apocalypse-level tragedy and questions of faith despite its occasionally silly undertones. In addition, I found myself even more shocked at how uncomfortably gratuitous the disaster scenes in this film could be.

The movie follows an astrophysics professor named John Koestler (Cage), whose son discovers a peculiar document in a 50-year-old time capsule, containing only numbers written out in an illogical sequence. During a night of lonely drinking, Cage's Koestler conveniently stumbles upon the revelation that these numbers map out every major disaster to occur over the last 50 years by date, number of people killed and geographical coordinates of where the incident occurred. He then realizes the future dates, the final of which predicts an extinction level event.

Recently re-released on 4K Ultra HD, "Knowing" gets a slight visual upgrade from its original 2K scan. However, this is in no way true 4K, an unfortunate trend given the rising popularity of the format. The sound on this release, however, is absolutely ferocious during the disaster sequences. The only downfall is in the mixing, which will have you raising your volume during dialogue scenes then frantically lowering it once the deafening action kicks in. The meager bonus features on the 4K re-release are simply carried over from the original Blu-ray release. They include:

� Audio commentary by director Alex Proyas
� "Visions of the Apocalypse" Featurette
� "Knowing All: The Making of a Futuristic Thriller" Featurette

"Knowing"
4K Ultra HD Combo Pack w/ Blu-ray & Digital Copy
$22.99
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