Doom
Service
by Howard Schumann
According to Mayan and the Aztec cosmology, there have
been four previous worlds and we are now in the Fifth World. Each of
the prior worlds was destroyed in a cataclysm, but as one world is destroyed,
another is reborn. Alex Proyas’ metaphysical thriller Knowing
speculates about such weighty subjects and about whether the universe
unfolds randomly according to chance or deterministically according
to a preconceived plan. It is an entertaining and ambitious film providing
much food for thought, though perhaps it is more audacious than successful.
The film opens
fifty years ago at Lexington, Massachusetts' William Dawes Elementary
School. Miss Taylor (Danielle Carter) asks her students to draw a picture
about what the world will look like in their imagination in fifty years,
the pictures to be stored in a time capsule to be opened in 2009. One
student, Lucinda Embry (Lara Robinson), a pale girl with a haunted look
on her face fills her paper with seemingly random rows of numbers, much
to the dismay of Miss Taylor. When the time capsule is opened fifty
years later, Lucinda’s paper is given to young Caleb, whose father
is Professor John Koestler (Nicolas Cage), a hard-drinking widower whose
wife died in a hotel fire only a few years ago.
Shockingly,
Professor Koestler discovers that the numbers on Lucinda’s paper
are predictive of the dates, number of people killed, and the latitude
and longitude of every major disaster occurring in the last fifty years,
with a harbinger of similar events to come, the final one suggesting
the possibility of massive global destruction. As a physics professor,
Koestler believes in the randomness of the universe, that “stuff”
happens, but the unfolding events that seem to involve his son cause
him to question the role fate plays in our lives, especially when Caleb
is approached by otherworldly creatures he calls “the whisperers”
who communicate telepathically. Whether the creatures are aliens or
angels is left to the viewer to decide, but their main function in the
film seems to be mainly to scare the bejabbers out of the audience.
Koestler enlists
the help of Diana Wayland (Rose Byrne), daughter of the girl who wrote
the prophecies fifty years before, and her young daughter Abby (Lara
Robinson) who also talks to the “whisperers” to attempt
to prevent the predicted events from happening, but the most he can
do is stand around, pick up bodies, or shout furiously. While more thoughtful
than most disaster movies, Knowing has its share of explosions,
chase sequences, and assorted vehicle accidents, including a state-of-the
art plane crash in an open field near Logan Airport, and an off track
subway train hurtling through a tunnel at breakneck speed, but, by the
end, the film moves from over-the-top frenzy to a more subtler level
that brings in apocalyptic and religious themes.
Proyas must
be commended for tackling important questions, and he has produced a
work of excitement, imagination, and some chills, even though it is
marred by a one-dimensional performance from Cage, whose emotions range
from worried concern to frantic hysteria. Credit should also be given
to the studio for giving the green light to a project which will inevitably
divide people because of its subject matter and because it dares to
introduce an element of faith and hope into typical doomsday scenarios.
Some critics have attempted to scare off viewers by waving the dreaded
“New Age” flag but hopefully today’s viewers are more
sophisticated. After all, this is a new age, whether or not some people
have gotten the message, and any film that challenges us to explore
ideas about life and its future on planet Earth, while providing music
from Beethoven’s Seventh Symphony, has a lot to offer.
"Timewave
Zero" is the theory postulated by author/philosopher Terence McKenna
that calculates the rise and fall of novelty (dynamic change) in the
universe. When McKenna graphed it over time, he found that it reached
infinity on December, 21 2012, the end of the current Baktun cycle of
the long-count calendar of the ancient Mayas. Since the concept was
introduced in the 1970s by McKenna and Jose Arguellos, speculation has
been rampant as to what the world might look like when it approaches
its omega point, and there have been a plethora of books and films on
the subject in recent years, the most anticipated being Roland Emmerich’s
film 2012 due in October. A recent direct to DVD documentary,
2012: Science or Superstition, directed by
Nimrod Erez, explores the meaning of the Mayan Calendar’s end
date and what it might mean for the world, and does so with restraint
and intelligence.
Talking heads
discuss whether 2012 will bring a singular catastrophic event, a gradual
transition to a higher level of consciousness, or nothing at all. The
documentary features discussion by such unconventional thinkers as Graham
Hancock, author of the major international bestsellers The Sign
and The Seal, Fingerprints of the Gods, Supernatural,
and Heaven's Mirror; John Major Jenkins, an independent researcher
who has devoted himself to reconstructing ancient Mayan cosmology and
philosophy; Daniel Pinchbeck, author and lecturer who in 1994 was chosen
by The New York Times Magazine as one of "thirty under thirty"
destined to change our culture; Alberto Villoldo, PhD, a medical anthropologist;
and Anthony F. Aveni, the Russell B. Colgate Professor of Astronomy
and Anthropology, considered one of the founders of Mesoamerican archaeoastronomy.
Other speakers
include: Robert Bauval, Jim Marrs, Walter Cruttenden, Lawrence E. Joseph,
Douglas Rushkoff, John Anthony West and Benito Vegas Duran. Unlike some
History Channel documentaries, the speakers are given ample opportunity
to develop their points of view and narration is kept to a minimum.
As evidence for sudden change, they point to the melting of the polar
ice caps, the weakening of the magnetic field and shifting of the poles,
the drastic increase of solar flares, the increase in natural disasters,
and the rare alignment of the Earth, Sun, and the center of the Milky
Way on the December 2012 solstice. According to this belief, the alignment
is tied to the precession of the equinoxes (approximately every 2160
years, the constellation visible on the early morning of the spring
equinox changes) and signals a transition from one world age to another.
There are few
voices of dissent, however, and no debate takes place about such questions
as why the Mayans devised a calendar some time around 500 BC, with a
back-dated ‘start date’ in 3114 BC, or what the true significance
of a recurring 1,872,000 day cycle (approximately equal to 5125.36 years)
as a whole might be. There are also no interviews with scholars of Mayan
civilization or people such as Sandra Noble, executive director of the
Foundation for the Advancement of Mesoamerican Studies, Inc. who has
said, "For the ancient Maya, it was a huge celebration to make
it to the end of a whole cycle. To render December 21, 2012, as a doomsday
or moment of cosmic shifting is a complete fabrication and a chance
for a lot of people to cash in." Also not discussed, is the fact
that the galactic alignment in question takes place over a 36-year period,
and the nucleus of the Milky Way could not have been identified without
high-powered telescopes which the Mayans did not have.
2012:
Science or Superstition thankfully does not include professional
debunkers, scientific or otherwise, and the word “nonsense”
is not even heard once during the film, yet, while I am supportive of
the ideas discussed, a bit more controversy would have livened up the
proceedings, including discussion of biblical prophecy, crop circles,
UFOs, and the exponential growth in spirituality worldwide pointing
to a paradigm shift. While thought provoking, 2012: Science or Superstition
is a pretty bloodless affair, with dramatics mostly eliminated, yet
it is a valuable source of information and adds to the growing interest
in what many forecast will be the end of civilization and/or a new beginning.
Those who want to be blown out of their seats, however, will have to
wait for Roland Emmerich.
©2008 Howard Schumann
CineScene
