We got Next from Netflix over the weekend… I remember seeing previews for this movie when it was coming out in theaters, but then it just vanished overnight. I don’t even remember seeing it listed on the marquee at our local theater. So, I assumed it must be pretty horrible… I mean, if you’ve got Nicolas Cage in a movie and it vanishes overnight you’ve got problems.

However, I was very surprised to discover that Next is actually more than halfway decent.  It was actually pretty darn good.

To start with, you’ve got a very interesting story.  Next is (very) loosely based on The Golden Man by Philip K. Dick.  The protagonist, Cris Johnson, is a Las Vegas stage magician who can see two minutes into his future.  He’s been using that gift sparingly – spicing up his stage act and winning just enough in the casinos to pay his bills.  But then the FBI finds out about him, and wants to use him to find a missing nuclear weapon.

Now, the story itself has basically nothing to do with what PKD wrote aside from the protagonist seeing the future.  But Next does manage to capture the surreal feeling of most of PKD’s writings.  You’re never quite sure  what you’re seeing…  Is it really the now that you’re seeing?  Or one of the many possible futures that Cris can see?

Then we’ve got some surprisingly good character development on most fronts.  Cris isn’t a noble champion of good, he just wants to be left alone to live his life.  His actions throughout the movie are ultimately very self-serving – he isn’t much of a hero at all.  Callie, despite being one of the “good guys”, comes across as nearly villainous in her pursuit of the lost nuke.  She’s truly been consumed by her duty.  Even poor Liz, who’s only real purpose in the movie is to manipulate Cris, is given some decent development.

And finally we’ve got acting that is at least good enough not to get in the way of the story.  I didn’t see anything amazing…  But I also wasn’t painfully aware of the fact that I was watching a movie.

All of which leaves me wondering why it didn’t do better in theaters.  The best I can guess is that Nicolas Cage isn’t very heroic, and the movie leaves lots of questions unanswered – two things that American audiences don’t like very much.

Posted on November 26 at 1:10 PM