Review: Next

Sporting a horrendous hairstyle and worse make-up, Nicolas Cage looks spaced out in Next, writes Rashid Irani.

Next
Cast:

HT Image

Nicolas Cage, Julianne Moore

Direction:

Lee Tamahori

Rating:

**

Novels by the cult sci-fi writer Philip K Dick have sparked such memorable movies as

Blade Runner

(1982),

Total Recall

(1990) and

Minority Report

(2002). Alas,

Next

, loosely based on his short story,

The Golden Man,

isn’t likely to be added to the honour list. In fact, this star-powered actioner is at best, mediocre.

For starters, try to figure out why a Las Vegas magician (Cage) is under constant surveillance by an FBI. agent (Moore). It seems the man has the gift --- or is it a curse ? --- to see two minutes ahead into his future. While he would like to use his freaky power to connect with a beautiful woman (Jessica Biel), who appears in his visions, the feds want him to retrieve a nuclear weapon stolen by terrorists. Baloney? Quite.

The script, attributed to as many as three writers, often leaves us in a state of dire confusion. Moreover, there is no effort to explore the emotional aspects of the magician’s life.

Once Were Warriors,

the Bond caper

Die Another Day

) appears to be hedged in by commercial considerations. Even the chases, explosions and shoot-outs are strictly humdrum.

The redoubtable Julianne Moore is surprisingly lustreless. Jessica Biel is mere off-the-shelf eye-candy. Sporting a horrendous hairstyle and worse make-up, Nicolas Cage looks spaced out.

Recommended? Nope.