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OMFG

OMFG

I DIDN'T KNOW ABOUT THIS!

I have pretty much no desire to see this movie, but my beloved Nic finally as Superman?! That I have to see

Nicolas Cage as Kal-El/Superman THE FLASH (2023) dir. Andrés Muschietti

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Maintenance and Blogkeeping

Hey all!

I know this blog has like, one regular follower, but I've been thinking about changing things up a bit and (gasp!) doing more varied content than just our beloved Nicolas here. Obviously he will always take priority, but I dunno, I think it might be fun to do posts about other fun/wierd movies, too. Maybe even the occasional video game.

Anywho, thoughts, considerations?

Expect changes in the next week or so if no comments.

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Prisoners of the Ghostland (2021)

I dunno about y'all, but I was hella excited when I first saw the trailer for this one. Japanese horror western? One of the wildest things Cage has ever done? Sign me the fuck up.

Well, the loving husband got me a nice edition of it for my birthaversary, so let's get started!

A twisted fever dream of east meets west, Prisoners of the Ghostland is ostensibly the story of a bank robber taken from prison and sent to bring back the governor's daughter, who ran away. Our hero, played by our beloved Nicolas, has no name and is simply "Hero."

The girl's father, who is the epitome of "you're why your daughter ran away" actually tricks Hero into to putting on the infamous suit from the trailer, and I will say, there is a sick logic to it--it's all to prevent Hero from harming Bernice, although as we'll later find out, that's probably not something he'd do. He tracks her to the titular Ghostlands, an area horrifically polluted with toxic waste and guarded by some horrifying ghosts who won't let anyone leave. At least, I'm pretty sure they're ghosts. Probably.

The line between what is and isn't real is very blurry, and finding the trivia fact that the director's favorite Nicholas Cage film is Wild At Heart really made it make a lot of sense. For those who don't remember my review of that one, that's the one directed by David Lynch, who is known for the dreamlike qualities of his work. This is an obvious influence and inspiration once you know it, and I think Lynch would probably really like some parts of this, if not the entire thing.

The surreality of it is aided by the director's knowledge of what's truly horrifying: large people talking in unison, people moving wierdly, broken mannequins, people in masks not moving or speaking, and, of course, radiation.

By the end, I found the Lynchian qualities more compelling than our darling Nic. Make no mistake, this is very much an art film, and everything in it is very intentional, from staging and framing to costuming to oddly stilted and seemingly out of place dialogue (some of which is quite memorable). It has an extremely theatrical feel, right down to Greek choruses (well, technically japanese but you get what I'm selling) and creates a vibrant world with surprisingly few sets. Like, you could adapt this to the stage fairly easily. The costuming is eccentric, ranging from traditional Japanese clothing to typical old west/American clothing. It's ostensibly post apocalyptic (at least for the Ghostlands and Samurai town), but fairly modern cars exist. We do get flashbacks of Hero's bank heist, and it looks relatively modern, but honestly, who knows. There's no cell phones, so it's not current day.

There is a metric fuck ton of references and symbolism, some of which is easier to catch than others. Great movie for your film class paper, tbh. Many will recognize a familiar face in the wanted posters at the sheriff's office as Lupin III, fewer will recognize the name of Goemon Ishikawa on another poster (unless you've played Persona 5 or studied Japanese folk heroes), but that's also a fun nod.

Throughout you'll find all of the standard tropes of a western, but often a bit off kilter. For example, one of the more prominent characters in the Ghostlands is obviously the preacher man. However, when we finally get to hear him reading from his book he clutches so tightly, it's not the bible.

We also get some samurai, although arguably more ronin. I'm not a huge expert on that end of things, but there's some fun sword play. Which, it's extra fun because the period in Japan with samurai was concurrent with the old west, so it's not as odd as you'd think.

Overall, I think I liked it fairly well, although I'm not sure it's something you like or dislike. It's really very much just like experiencing a dream with Nicolas Cage cast in the main role. Though, speaking of our main man, I wouldn't say his performance was exceptional either way. He was definitely present and professional about it, but he was also just doing his job. There's a couple scenes where he goes full Cage, but he's positively sedate for most of it. He sticks out, also blends in, and honestly, I think the director did a fabulous job because Cage didn't completely eclipse everyone and everything else in the film. A lot of the time he does, and I don't think that's Cage's fault, he's just really intense and I think a lot of people don't know how to work with that level of intensity.

Overall rating:

4 David Lynches out of 5 (one subtracted due to lynch not being involved)

4 Nicholas Cages out of 5

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Willy's Wonderland (2021)

If you've seen the trailer for this, you know you're getting a Five Nights at Freddy's type of plot. Not my usual thing as it's a bit cliched and survival horror isn't really my thing. But who doesn't want to see our beloved Nic going apeshit on horrifying animatronics? That's gotta be fun, right?

Ehhh, not so much, actually. It's a slow burn, and not in a good way. Nic has exactly zero lines--he grunts at one point and that's it. All the dialogue is the various townie characters. On one hand, it's an interesting gimmick and gives Nic a different way to show his acting chops, but on the other, it makes it kinda boring.

Your setup is that he's a drifter who needs new tires, but of course, the car won't be ready until the next day. He's a bit down on his luck as well, so they tell him if he stays the night at Willy's and cleans the place, the work will be free. Of course, the animatronics are fucking evil and sentient. He cleans the place and kills the animatronics as they come after him. At one point we wind up with a group of teens who try to rescue him, two guesses what happens to them. The only really wierd thing is that "the janitor" (Nic's character doesn't even have a name) is apparently on a very strict break schedule. His alarm goes off, and it's time to drink a soda and play pinball. He stops whatever he's doing to do that, and that's the only remotely comedic thing about this movie.

That's right, for a movie that's marketed as a comedy, it's not funny at all. It's incredibly cliched and honestly, you've already seen a dozen like it. The only difference is that it has Nicolas Cage and he never talks.

It's not his worst work, and from an acting standpoint it's interesting, but honestly, I was bored. It was boring and cliched. Nic is the only reason this thing will have made any money at all.

Two Nicholas Cages out of five because worse exists

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The picture here should definitely be Nicolas Cage. Not that trying to watch his entire filmography in a short period of time won't drive you mad, but don't we all love a good challenge?

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So my husband started reading the high points from this this and I was just like, is this satire?

At the same time, who else could possibly play Nicolas Cage in a biopic? I don't think there's anyone else out there who can hit that level of intensity

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Mandy

So, I wanted to see this one as soon as I saw a trailer for it. Nicolas Cage in a horror movie? Sign me up!

Anyway, one thing lead to another and it sat around for a while before I finally watched it.

At two hours, Mandy covers a lot of ground, and it does it very slowly. I want to give two warnings before I go much further. 1) This movie is absolutely not for children. It's unrated, but I would definitely not show it to anyone under 18 unless I wanted to pay for a lot of therapy and get woken up to deal with nightmares for weeks. 2) This movie is a slow burn. Very slow. Take your ADHD meds, you'll need them.

That said, overall this is just a fucking amazing film. It's absolutely gorgeous, any still would be a beautiful painting. It's filled in the style of an old b horror movie, and honestly the film grain really makes it. This would be a totally different film without it. The sound is highly atmospheric, and all in all it's very trippy. Cage is fucking amazing, and I might argue at his best. Not at peak Cage, but at his actual best. By the end I forgot he was Nicolas Cage. It's also worth noting that Mandy is initially highly influence by a number of classic horror and pop culture sources. Personally, I saw a Lynchian influence in much of the beginning, as well as Phantasm, and definitely some Hellraiser. I would also add that it's wonderfully written and quite quotable. I can't wait for when the time is right to pull out, "You exude a cosmic darkness."

Arguably the first horror movie we've really seen him in, the trailer and the back cover copy lie. They're not wrong, but.... We might get spoilery, so here's a break.

Shit goes bad wrong.

And that's the first half of the movie. It's very atmospheric and dreamlike, yet utterly ordinary. Honestly, it was kinda boring and I almost stopped watching, I won't lie. By the end of the first hour I almost stopped watching because shit had gotten that sick and fucked up.

But I stuck it out, and I'm so glad I did. Ultimately, while a romance, this is also a revenge movie, and, I would argue, a descent into madness and the abyss, possibly even just hell. You could do a dissertation on this thing, no joke. And let's be honest, no one does a descent into madness like our darling Nic. Usually it's less bloody, and I gotta say, he should've been doing stuff like this the entire time. He honestly doesn't have a lot of lines, so he really gets to show his skills as an actor, and boy, does he. If you want to see what I would consider one of his best performances, you have to watch this. Keep the lights on, stay sober, and make sure you're in a good headspace because this movie will fuck you up. My husband got a series of life reaction texts while I was watching and I couldn't tell you how many of them were "what the hell" and "omg." There were actually a couple of scenes I had to rewind and watch again. The first was the death of a village who was watching porn because was that really? Omg yes it was. The second was just after the chainsaw fight (the trailer didn't lie about that). Cage is swinging a chain around and the way it's lit is just drop dead gorgeous. I wouldn't mind a poster of that shot, tbh.

Cage is an absolute madman (well, he becomes one at least) and honestly at his most dangerous here. I kinda feel like I need to wash my brain with black after finishing this, but it really was amazing and I heartily recommend it. Of course, now I've got to go back and watch the director's other movie, and now I'm even more stoked for the upcoming Colour Out of Space, which again has the same director and our beloved Nic, but with 100% more Lovecraft.

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The Wickerman

This was one I actually saw before I embarked on this escapade, and I actually liked it at the time.  The reason it’s taken so long is I wanted to do a double feature and compare it to the old one from the 70s.  Well, I’m down sick today, so my loss is your gain.

Theses are two very different movies, in spite of a a significant portion of the dialogue in Nick’s version being pulled straight from the older version.  It was very odd, because in some ways they’re the same, but in others.... The basic plot is still the same--a cop gets a letter with a picture about a missing girl and goes to investigate, only to find himself stuck on an island with a bunch of dodgy pagans who lie to him and eventually, well, we’ll get to that.  Nick, of course, plays the cop in question, one Edward Malus, and I have to say, I much preferred Malus to Sergeant Howie in the older version.  Malus is a much more likeable character and much easier to identify with, whereas Howie is, to be blunt, an asshole.  That said, Howie is on much firmer ground with his actions as he actually has jurisdiction, whereas Malus is an out of state cop.  The next biggest difference is your villagers.  The villagers Malus meets are matriarchal and severe, almost appearing amish, whereas Howie’s villagers are...more liberated, so to speak.  Okay, let’s just say Nick’s Wickerman movie didn’t have an orgy in the cemetery, okay?  Both movies picked very different pagan traditions to pull from.  The 70s one was very wild, and honestly more accurate, whereas the 2000s version pulled from the whole mother goddess vaguely Dianic traditions that had picked up a lot of steam by that point.  Basically, the 70s one was just pagans being pagans and happening to have a human sacrifice to appease the gods and bring back the harvest, while Nick’s version was crazy psycho evil matriarchs. Also new to Nick’s version was the bees.  The 70s folks grew apples, so switching to bees and making Malus allergic to bees really ramped up the danger level and, of course, gave us the iconic meme. Overall, the later version was frankly much more of a straight up horror movie and a lot more violent.  Admittedly, I did not watch the theatrical version, so I got the extra nasty ending.  But the villagers of SummersIsle (2006) are just so much meaner and nastier than those of Summerisle (1973).  Maybe it’s because Nick’s character was so much nicer.  Like, he’s Nicolas Cage, we can’t hate him, he’s so lovable.  Whereas Edward Woodward’s Sergeant Howie was such a disrespectful dick spouting Jesus and being a seriously judgy mf.  So, anyway, once our hero finds the kid, we get the big reveal that it was all a game to lure him to the island “of his own free will” to burn him alive in the titular wicker man.  Sergeant Howie is such a proselytizing dick that I actually wasn’t too sore about it.  I mean,it’s not cool to burn people alive or sacrifice them to the old gods, but eh, that world is better off without him.  Plus he got stripped down and anointed by hot chicks who like, dried him with their hair and shit.  They also gave him fresh clothing.  Then again, they put him in a lower compartment in the wicker man so he was right under the pig.  Hope the pig hadn’t eaten recently.  But the pagans did sing a lovely song while he burned to death, that’s something, right? Malus, on the other hand, (and again, I have no idea what they did in the theatrical version) got his legs brutally broken, anaphylactic shock, and then hauled up to the top of the wicker man so he could pass out from smoke inhalation first, I guess.   Also worth noting is that instead of the cult leader setting the fire, it was the girl Malus went to save--who turned out to be his daughter.  Overall, I very much preferred the older one.  While I loved Nick’s performance in the more recent version, the one from the 70s was just more human.  It had a fun and mischievous vibe and felt a lot less dark.  I think the 2000s one was changed to appeal to a modern horror audience, which murdered the pacing.  The newer one also lacked the music and occult accuracy of the older Wicker Man.  And while Ellen Burstyn did a very good job as cult leader Sister SummersIsle, it’s completely impossible to step into the shoes of Christopher Lee, who played Lord Summerisle in the 70s.  You can’t follow or replace Christopher Lee.  You just can’t.  That said, I very much enjoyed our dear Nicolas Cage’s performance, and I feel like it would have been amazing if we could somehow take the older movie and stick him in it.  I think that would be the best of both worlds, really.

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Spider-man: Into the Spiderverse

So I totally forgot to review this one, even though I saw it opening weekend.  Better late than never, right?

This was absolutely fantastic, and well deserving of it’s Oscar.  The animation is some of the best I’ve ever seen, and the writing, acting, and music choices were all terrific.  It was also really great to see Miles Morales finally make it to the big screen.  I didn’t care much for the character when he first started, but he’s really come in to his own, and I’m starting to like him better than Peter Parker. So let’s get to our beloved Nicolas.  In this he plays Spiderman Noir, and it is an absolute perfect fit.  This particular spiderman is a variation that’s well, a noir detective in like the 20s.  Cage’s over the top sense of drama is perfect for this role, and sets a wonderful contrast to the other spiderpeople, some of whom are rather silly.  He plays it deadpan and serious, exactly as he should.  It’s also great for Cage, because he’s always had a passion for superheroes, and I’m so glad he finally got to play one as major as Spiderman.  Honestly, I’m down for a live action Spiderman Noir with him after this.  It would be so awesome!

Anywho, this was a fantastic movie, and I heartily reccomend it!

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So glad you’re back!

Squeee! Fan mail! I'm not going to try to do them all in a year again, that was madness, but I'm hoping to get periodic reviews up. Glad to see ya again!

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Between Worlds

I bet you thought this blog had died, didn't you. Honestly I just Caged myself out for a time. Now that he seems to have switched genres again to more paranormal/horror, I'm ready to try and pick back up again. I still need to get Mandy, but for now we've got this new gem.

Between Worlds is a bit of a sleeper that tells the story of truck driver Joe,who lost his wife and daughter in a fire. Things are not going well for Joe but he's still a good guy, so when he meets a woman on the road whose daughter is in a coma, he helps her out. In this case the woman has a psychic ability to cross over and bring back spirits, and of course she does this to save her daughter.

Except it's not her daughter she brings back but Joe's dead wife, and if you thinks this ends badly you would be right. I don't want to go into too much details because spoilers, but it's honestly an interesting movie. The pacing is a little slow, and overall it's rather Lynchian, which is especially noticeable in the soundtrack. Somebody was a fan of Twin Peaks. At one point there's even a theme that's reminiscent of Audrey's theme. Cage is positively subdued throughout, and he does a couple of really nice monologues (the one where he tells the story of the dead wife and daughter is beautifully done). He doesn't really hit the standard Cage level until the very end, at which point you see exactly why he was hired for this movie.

Overall this movie had a subtlety we don't often see in Cage's work, which was kind of refreshing. I think I've been ranking these, but I'm still kind of making up my mind on this one. It's something to be lingered on.

I'm going to say 3.5 starts out of five

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The taste of failure

So, by this point, it’s fair to say I have failed in my goal to watch every Nicolas cage movie in 2017.  I underestimated the challenge, and OD’d.

That said, I do still want to make it through this challenge eventually, so this blog will remain open, and posts will be made as I continue at a glacially slow place.  Thanks for joining me on this adventure!!

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A friend sent this image to me.  That poor cat just can’t handle our darling Nic’s regal look.

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July 27, 2017--Rage

Another Netflix offering, and another paycheck movie, Rage is actually quite new, coming to us from 2014.  It tells the story of legit businessman Paul Maguire (played by our beloved Nicolas), who is a former criminal of epic proportions.  His daughter is abducted one night, and then her body shows up not too long after.  Maguire flies into a rage (lol) and gets in touch with his former partners in crime to find out who did the dastardly deed, leaving behind a trail of bodies and thoroughly pissing off the Russian mob in the process.

Generally speaking, it’s not a real standout movie, and it’s pretty forgettable.  That said, there was something about this one that felt...I dunno, oddly satisfying?  It was well executed, and there was loads of action.  I actually really liked who wound up being the killer of the daughter.  I didn’t see that coming, and it was nice to get back to that Nic Cage movies not being what I expected feel I had earlier in the year.

While nothing exceptional, I was still entertained, and I’m going to give this a generous three Nicolas Cages out of five.

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July 25, 2017--The Sorcerer’s Apprentice

The last few really weren’t my thing, so I decided to pop in one of my favorites.

The Sorcerer’s Apprentice comes to us from 2010 and is loosely based on the iconic scene from Fantasia where Mickey brings the brooms to life as a cleaning shortcut and havoc ensues.  Of course, you can’t make an entire movie based on a short, so they fleshed things out rather a lot.

Our beloved Nicolas plays sorcerer Balthazar Blake, one of three apprentices trained by Merlin himself.  Balthazar has been looking for the heir to Merlin’s power so that Morgana Le Fée can finally be defeated, once and for all.  Enter David Stutler, played by Jay Baruchel.  Dave has a chance encounter with Balthazar as a child, and when we next see him, he’s a total physics nerd and a disturbingly accurate Mickey Mouse as a human.  Balthazar comes back to train him, there’s much zany action and fun with tesla coils, there are villainous villians, the pretty girl that got away, and, of course, the iconic mop scene.

Now, I’ve got a soft spot for urban fantasy, so this one was pretty much destined to become a favorite for me. I’m going to try to be objective, though, don’t worry.

Overall, everyone does a great job in this.  It’s fun and light, and the effects are well done.  It’s pretty clear that everyone is having a blast.  Of course, as we know, Nic is quite the nerd himself, so we know how much fun he had playing the mysterious sorcerer Balthazar, and that enjoyment really comes through.  Honestly, Nic should play grouchy old wizards more often, he does it splendidly.

I could go on into gory detail about all of the cool stuff and funny jokes (seriously, there’s some awesome tesla coil effects), but you really should watch it for yourself.  It’s a light and fun feel good movie, perfect for a night when you’re feeling kind of down.

Four Nicolas Cages out of five because it’s a favorite, but I’m still trying to be objective.