Susan Granger’s review of “Next” (Paramount Pictures)
Taking his turn at an early summer popcorn picture, Nicholas Cage plays a ‘pre-cog,’ a man with the uncanny power to see two minutes into the future.
Clad in a velvet tux with a ruffled seafoam-green shirt, Cris Johnson (Cage) is a run-of-the-mill Las Vegas lounge magician. Tormented by his extraordinary ability and sick of the examinations he underwent as a child, he’s chosen anonymity, using the name Frank Cadillac and living off his minimal blackjack “winnings.” (He sees the cards that are coming and bets accordingly.) That is – until an Eastern European terrorist group threatens to detonate a dirty nuclear device in Los Angeles and FBI agent Callie Ferris (Julianne Moore) tries to convince him to use his extraordinary talent for precognition to stop the inevitable catastrophe. He’s dubious about the advantage of a 120-second warning, but when he uses his visions to avert a shooting during a casino robbery, he becomes a fugitive, picking up Liz Cooper (Jessica Biel) who teaches underprivileged kids at a school at the bottom of the Grand Canyon. They careen through the Arizona desert, evading both the FBI and a band of assassins who are determined to kill him before he can help the feds.
While ostensibly adapted from the 1954 Philip K. Dick sci-fi story, “The Golden Man,” the updated screenplay, credited to Gary Goldman, Jonathan Hensleigh and Paul Bernbaum, veers in a totally different direction. Director Lee Tamahori (XXX: State of the Union”) relies on formulaic crashing cars and a landslide for fast-paced action – and Liz gets strapped with explosives. Oh, yeah, and that’s Peter Falk popping in as Cris’ mentor. On the Granger Movie Gauge of 1 to 10, “Next” is a predictable, implausible 3, a silly seer-tale. Consider this your two-minute warning.
