Set in futuristic Metro City, a small city that floats on top of Earth, Toby Tenma (Freddie Highmore) is an 11-year-old boy genius whose father is the Head of Ministry of Science. Toby sneaks into the demonstration room when his father and other scientist are experimenting with the two cores of energy, a “positive” (good) blue core and a “negative” (evil) red core and he ends up evaporated by a robot called “The Peacekeeper” which is powered by red core.
Devastated by the lost of his son, Dr. Tenma (Nicolas Cage) works day and night to create a robot that reassembles his son and has all of Toby’s memory by using the hair strand of his son left on the cap. He powers him up with the blue core and is excited to spend time with his son, he soon realizes it isn’t the same and the new Toby reminds him that his son is gone.
By accident, Toby learns that he is actually a robot and can fly but President Stone also discovers Toby’s blue core energy and tries to capture him. He ends up on the surface of Earth and finds a group of kids led by a caretaker named Hamegg as well as some robot friends to learn the purpose and true meaning of life only to be forced to fight ala Roman style with other robots in a stadium with robots after Hamegg reveals Astro as a robot. Astro forcefully wipe out all the robots but refuses to fight Zog, a giant construction robot which he revives using his blue core energy. The military then arrives and captures Astro.
Back in the lab which Astro is created, Dr. Tenma takes out the blue core and apologizes to Astro but Astro apologizes for not able to be a better son. Dr. Tenma’s conscience comes to mind when he almost gives the blue core to President Stone. Instead, he puts it back in Astro and tells him to escape. Stone uses the red stone to activate The Peacekeeper but is absorbed into it. The Peacekeeper then goes on rampage, destroying everything in its path in order to get Astro. In the end, Astro sacrifices himself to stop the Peacekeeper and dies since the blue core was drained from the explosion.
Zog then arrives and revives Astro with some of the blue core energy Astro gave him previously.
Overall, Astro Boy is a brilliant animated film with great morale value. The film is suitable for kids and adult alike and is a great way to introduce the original Japanese manga to everyone. Astro Boy may be a robot, but he certainly has a great heart, or more like a “positive” core. So, is the movie.
Knowing is an action-packed science-fiction thriller starring Nicolas Cage. The movie premiered on March 20, 2009 in the US and opens on March 26, 2009 in Malaysia.
The movie begins with the year 1959 where a competition is held between the students of an elementary school. The winning idea from a student called Lucinda Embry is to bury a time-capsule of all the students drawing of the future they can imagine to be opened 50 years later. Instead of drawing pictures, Lucinda writes down numbers but is prevented from finishing them. Later, she goes missing and her teacher finds her in a gym closet, scratching the remaining numbers onto the wooden door.
Five decades later, the time capsule is opened and the drawings are handed over to the children. Caleb Koestler (Chandler Canterbury), the son of John Koestler (Nicolas Cage) receives Lucinda’s envelope. John, an MIT professor and an astrophysicist, initially ignored the numbers but accidentally discovers that the numbers are no coincident but a serial of dates and death tolls of every major disaster in the last 50 years, with three events have not happened.
When John realizes the remaining numbers are the GPS coordinates, he witnesses a tragic plane crash which kills 81 people and he is almost traumatized by it as he has seen people burning before their death. After seeing an unknown man popping outside of his house occasionally, John decides to contact Lucinda’s daughter, Diana (Rose Byrne) to gain more insights, but is turned away.
After the second event John has predicted occurred, Diana and her daughter Abby visit John and Caleb. Both Caleb and Abby are able to hear the "whisper people" just like Lucinda. Initially, John thinks the last event will only kill 33 people but finds out it is actually "EE" backwards. After investigating Lucinda’s mobile trailer, they find out that "EE" stands for "Everyone Else". John then figures out there will be a massive solar flare which will kill everyone else.
Diana tries to get the kids to the cave where she believes could shelter them from the solar flare while John tries to figure out the last numbers scratched by Lucinda on the wooden door. Diana’s impatience makes her drive the kids to the cave without waiting for John. During the stop at the gas station, the "whisper people" hijack Diana’s car with the two children. Diana gives a chase in another car but is killed by a truck at midnight when she runs the red light, just like her mother predicted.
When John returns to Lucinda’s mobile home, he finds out that Caleb and Abby are safe in the hands of the "whisper people" who are revealed as celestial beings who invite the selected children to escape the disaster and help them start all over again in another planet resembling Earth. A solar flare hits Earth and kills every single life on the planet. Caleb and Abby are then seen dressed in all white in a beautiful landscape which has at least two moons, running towards a huge white tree.
Overall, the movie may seem interesting in the first place with the likes of Da Vinci Code, Final Destination, The Armageddon and Eagle Eye merged into one movie. But, with the ending, it seems like the movie which ripped off The Day The Earth Stood Still as well. Somehow, what amazes me is how everything is put together — the mystery of the numbers, the actions from the disasters, the terrifying "whisper people" who turns out to be celestial angel-like beings onto a single film.
Knowing is a gripping action-thriller of global proportions about a professor (Nicolas Cage) who stumbles on terrifying predictions about the future and sets out to prevent them from coming true. Knowing is set to be released on March 20, 2009.
Benjamin Franklin Gates (Nicolas Cage) and his sidekick Riley Poole (Justin Bartha) continue their adventures from National Treasure (2004) in search for treasure.
Riley Poole might be Benjamin Gates’ sidekick but he has written a book and is having a book launching in a bookstore. While the public only remembers Ben Gates, Riley feels belittled and has got his red Ferrari towed for not able to pay the taxes.
Benjamin Gates and Abigail inside the Oval Ofice
Ben Gates is presenting information about the Abraham Lincoln’s assassin, John Wilkes Booth and the 18 pages missing from Booth’s diary when one man stands up and presents a missing page of John Wilkes Booth’s diary. It is Mitch Wilkinson (Ed Harris), a man who just wants to make a name in history. The page mentions Thomas Gates, Ben’s great-grandfather who could have been a person involved with Abraham Lincoln’s assasination. In order to prove the innocence of his great-grandfather, Ben Gates is determined to solve the puzzle with the faintest clues that he has. With the help of his dad, Patrick Gates (Jon Voight), mom, Emily Appleton Gates (Helen Mirren), together with his estranged girlfriend Abigail (Diane Kruger) and his loyal sidekick, Riley Poole, Ben manages to find clues from going to Paris’s Statue of Liberty to a chunk of wood from one of the Resolute Desks in Buckingham Palace. Later on, Gates’ dad reluctantly asks his ex-wife for help in translating the text found from the plank of wood which she points out that there is another piece missing. Ben concludes the other half is hidden in the other resolute desk in the Oval Office, in White House. And so happens, Ben’s former lover, Abigail is dating a guy from White House (so coincident, eh?) and during an Easter Party organized by the White House, Ben dares Connor (Ty Burrell) to bring Abigail into the Oval Office. And in order to prove Abigail he has got the power, Connor brings her into the Oval Office with Ben following along. Ben discovers that the plank is gone, instead finding a stamp bearing the seal of the Book of Secrets. According to Agent Sandusky (Harvey Keitel), the Book of Secrets contains documents collected by presidents for presidents’ eyes only, covering controversial topics as the JFK assassination and Area 51.
Diane Kruger and Nicolas Cage in National Treasure: Book of Secrets
In order to locate the Book of Secrets, Ben kidnaps the President (Bruce Greenwood) during his birthday celebration at Mount Vernon. The President eventually tells Ben that he has the Book of Secret hidden in the Library of Congress. While telling Ben the codes to access to the book, The President enigmatically tells Ben to check out page 47 while he’s on it. In the meantime, FBI agent Sandusky is hot on Ben’s trail for Ben’s kidnapping of the President. Ben sends the photographs he has taken to his father, asking him to get his mom to translate it. Having earlier cloned the cell phone belonging to Ben’s father, Mitch obtains the photograph of the second half of the plank and co-erces Ben’s mother to translate it for him. Eventually, the trail leads all of them to a small rock island behind Mount Rushmore, and a subterranean cavern housing the legendary long-lost Native American City of Gold Cibola. Inside the cavern, Ben’s parents and the rest are separated (by the intention of the director, I guess) where both Ben parents are united as well as Ben and his girlfriend. Though they manage to find the Ancient City of Gold Cibola hidden beneath the cavern, they realize they are trapped as water keeps flowing into the tunnel. As they manage to find a secret exit passage through the flow of the water, Mitch forces Ben to stay on to keep the door opens but as fate is not his side, Ben is somehow pushed by the current to the exit door and Mitch sacrifices himself in order to get his name credited for the discovery to let Ben and the others escape the flooded cavern.
Ben and the rest are then caught by the FBI and handed over to the President. The President tells his bodyguard that Ben saves his live and then he credits all of them for the discovery. While at it, Ben also mentions Mitch Wilkinson. The President replies, “Is that so?”.
In the ending scene, Riley gets his Ferrari back and in an envelope slipped on the windscreen is a letter from White House saying the car is tax-free!
Overall, the movie is good despite the plots seem like sequentially arranged in order for the next action to happen. While the puzzle-solving part is not as complicated as Da Vinci Code, the movie shows quite a bunchful of flaw with most part of the movie can easily be predicted. While at it, I am sure there is a sequel to this movie, thanks to page 47.
My ratings: 6.5 out of 10. Blatant actings, predictable plots and kidnapping of the US President? LoL!
Starring Nicolas Cage, Jessica Biel, Julianne Moore, Next is a movie about a Las Vegas magician who can see into the future is pursued by FBI agents seeking to use his abilities to prevent a nuclear terrorist attack.
