Tag Archives: Nicolas cage

THE UNBEARABLE WEIGHT OF MASSIVE TALENT (2022)

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THE UNBEARABLE WEIGHT OF MASSIVE TALENT (2022)

The cover to the Australian 4K release

One cannot merely walk into Nic-toberfest without discussing a film that is a love letter to the actor himself. The Unbearable Weight of Massive Talent is unusual in so much as it’s not an ego piece because initially when writer/ director Tom Gormican and writer Kevin Etten, he rejected it hard, and it wasn’t until he received a letter from Etten declaring it wasn’t a skit or an insult, it was a dedicated love letter to the man and his career, and that he wasn’t essentially playing himself, he was playing a version of himself: ‘Nick Cage’.

Nic Cage as the Meme Nick Cage

Note the spelling.

This whole Nic-toberfest that I run here on Digital Retribtuion is a tribute to Cage, and his 40 years in cinema . I know he has become a meme from this film, and people love the 1990 appearance on Wogan in the UK where he cartwheels into the show, karate kicks and throws money into the audience, but he’s made such a variety of hits and misses that he’s always entertaining, and aren’t we entertained by him no matter how bad the film is?!? Cage is a fan of the creative arts and I do admire his love dearly, and I hope I am able to maintain my love of pop culture the way he has.

Anyway, enough fanboying… and let’s review a film all about fanboying!

Nick Cage (Nicolas Cage) is having lots of trouble in his life; he can’t get work, and his daughter, Addy (Lily Mo Sheen), thinks he is an idiot… teenagers, right? He has decided to quit acting but is taking one last job of going to a birthday party, offered to him by his agent, Richard Fink (Neil Patrick Harris) for a fee of $1,000,000 which will round up his outstanding bills.

Pedro Pascal as the Meme Javi

This last gig is at the property of Javi Gutierrez (Pedro Pascal), who has written a script for him and is disturbed by his announcement of retirement. Before he goes to the property though, a fan at the airport, Vivian (Tiffany Haddish), slips a device into his pocket, and very quickly, Nick is involved in a plot involving American government agents and arms dealers.

I normally hate this kind of stuff, and that’s not to say I don’t love a good comedy, but this meta/ written by the internet/ meme-ish junk I just find stupid. That being said, I may have been bitten by The Machine with Burt Kreischer and Mark Hamill, which was the first film I saw at the cinema after the COVID lockdowns.

Nic Cage as Nicky

Covid was easy, that film made me hate cinema for about 6 months.

The thing that is fun about this film is is that it’s the bastard son of a romantic comedy (Cage’s and Pascal’s bromance) and a spy thriller, with a dash of mystery thrown in. Cage is clearly playing a parody of himself, and the appearance of his Id (or is it Ego, I can never remember) in the form of Nicky, him playing a younger arrogant version of himself, is hilarious and responsible for a scene that finally made me understand what ‘the Ick’ is.

… and if you think Cage’s performances are over the top, he exceeds himself here, and is matched beautifully by the insanity that is Pedro Pascal’s performance. Pascal plays the self-spoilt brat fan with so much gusto that it’s hard to remember his reserved performance as Din Djarin in Disney’s The Mandalorian. The scene of them dropping acid together is both ridiculous and fun at the same time.

Honestly, these over the top antics are replicated by many of the other cast as well, with Sharon Horgan as his ex-wife, and the aforementioned Sheen being the anchors in reality, giving the over the top performances an opportunity to really be silly and fun.

Here’s the problem though; I enjoyed some of the scenes, I thought the bromance was amusing, and recognising the meme in cinema form (you know the one, with Cage and a pascal looking at each other in a car) was fun, but essentially, it’s totally disposable. The script can’t exist without Cage, and I’m sure the other actors would not have been involved if Cage hadn’t put his hand up to do it, which he didn’t want to at first.

There’s some great stunts, a few funny moments but it is unnecessarily far too long. It’s a 90 minute script milked to almost 2 and a half hours, which it certainly did NOT need to be.

I’m a big Cage fan, obviously (it’s why Nic-toberfest exists!) but this doesn’t sit well with me much at all.

The menu screen for the Australian 4K release

Extras: A decent bunch of extras on this 4k disc.

Audio commentary and Deleted scenes (with optional commentary) by Gormican and Etten are certainly a love letter to Cage and cinema in general.

The Mind discusses Gormican and Etten’s ideas for a film where Nic Cage plays the actor Nick Cage, and selecting the other cast for the project.

Glimmers of a Bygone Age looks into the recreation of some of Cage’s older performances.

Everybody Needs a Javi investigates Pascal’s portrayal of Javi.

Nick, Nicky and Sergio looks into the idea of Nicky: the ultimate version of Cage that acts as his conscious? Advisor? It’s probably a Jiminy Cricket role. Sergio is a role he plays within the film who is a mafioso, and is a ball of fun as well.

Second Act Action is all about the stunts, and it’s always interesting to watch this sort of stuff.

Cages 5 and Up looks at a bunch of kids acting as Cage. The one doing ‘THE BEES!!’ Is gold.

SXSW Film Festival Q&A is a 15 minute Q&A after the screening of the film.

You can also weirdly set bookmarks on the disc and find them here… does anyone still do that?

Film: 4/10

Extras: 10/10

Rewatchability: 2/10

A lump of wax as Nic Cage

This film was purchased from JB Hifi

8MM (1999)

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The Australian Cinema Cult release of 8MM

8MM (1999)

You know how sometimes you watch a film and think what an absolute classic it is and wonder why it doesn’t get more respect? This is how I feel about this film, 8MM from 1999.

8MM is written by Andrew Kevin Walker, who also wrote Se7en and in my opinion, sits neatly next to that film in its story and quality of thrills. Maybe it doesn’t get the credit it deserves because it has Nicolas Cage instead of Brad Pitt as its lead, and Joachim Phoenix instead of Morgan Freeman, and in 1999 is was before Phoenix got his academy award, lending him ‘legitimacy’, and before Cage became everyone’s favourite meme for the Wicker Man… ‘the bees… THE BEEEEESSSSSSSS’.

This is the weird thing about this film is whilst it should be a A thriller, it feels like a B movie, which is something I believe Joel Schumacher (The Lost Boys), the director, was vying for: the sleazy subject matter perhaps deserved to be sleazy in its presentation. Probably a smart artistic decision but maybe it’s one of the reason why it’s not necessary regarded as highly as Se7en or Silence of the Lambs.

Nic Cage as Tom Welles

8MM tells of private investigator Tom Welles (Nicolas Cage) who is hired by Mrs Christian (Myra Carter), a millionaire’s widow, to inventive an 8MM film found amongst his belongings in a safe I his office. The contents of this film are that of a young girl being brutalised and murdered, and Mrs Christian wants to be assured that the film isn’t real.

Joaquin Phoenix as Max Californian

This leads Welles to getting assistance from porno shop worker Max California (Joaquin Phoenix) who takes him to the dark side of underground porno films, where he meets the likes of adult film star procurer Eddie Poole (James Gandolfini), porno Star Machine (Chris Bauer) and pornographer Dino Velvet (Peter Stormare), but will he find out the truth, or will he be drawn into a web of sleaze from which he may never return?

Jenny Powell as Mary Ann Mathew’s

Thrillers for me are just as important as horror, and I love a bit of crime/ gumshoe styled stuff as well… all these things are in a Venn diagram that has Giallo in the centre so I guess that makes sense. This film is a high point of crime and thriller and a massive dollop of noir within it as well.

Schumacher really shows just how accomplished a filmmaker he is with this film as it shows the personalities of the various cities and their population. He shows the underside of the porn world and the filming gets dirtier and dirtier as it goes on. Spectacular to watch. What I also really love is the fact that when we get to the end of the film and the ‘monster’ is revealed, its presented as a final scene in a Universal monster pic.

Walker’s script is solid too, and I reckon just as fine a pic as the aforementioned Se7en. In actual fact, I tend to hit a trilogy of films when I watch this, 8MM, Se7en and Silence of the Lambs. Three amazing thrillers that I reckon are all as good as each other but have various levels of respect from film fans and critics, 8MM being the embarrassing little brother who gets drunk before everyone else.

I really do think this film is high quality, even though it’s described as being to sleazy and predictable, of which the latter I don’t find to be true. Cage is really good in this as are the rest of the cast, even though the pornographers may be charactatures of those types of people were like in the 90s: I have no point of reference

I think it is definitely worth a revisit if you have not seen it in a while. Considering the advances in technology, the story still holds up nicely.

The menu screen for the film

Extras:

Just a little 5 minute making-of that was not really worth my 5 minutes.

Film:9/10

Extras: 2/10

Rewatchability: 10/10

Peter Stormare as Dino Velvet

This Bluray was purchased from JB HiFi

THE WICKER MAN (2006)

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THE WICKER MAN (2006)

The Australian Bluray of The Wicker Mam

I used to be a massive proponent of the remake. From John Carpenter’s The Thing, to Chuck Russel’s The Blob, even stuff like the Robin Williams Flubber one, or the Nutty Professor starring Eddie Murphy… but that’s all changed, I’m afraid.

Once movie companies realised that something they had assumed all along, that cinema goers are idiots just dying to see not a good film, but a license they are familiar with, they started taking advantage. Disney are probably the main offenders with their live action remakes of their own animated properties, some which aren’t ’live action’ at all but there is such a glut of unnecessary remakes that between it, comic movies, Star Wars and movies based on books by Steven King, there is barely anything new at the cinema at all anymore.

The very worst of these, or at the very least, one of the films that features high in the list of the worst of these is Neil LaBute’s remake of Robin Hardy’s magnificent 1973 film The Wicker Man. In it’s defence, it is beautiful shot and the female cast are amazing, but Nicolas Cage’s role as the male lead feels like an invasion into quality.

Hang on, I’m getting ahead of myself here.

Cage as Edward Malus

The Wicker Man (2006) tells of police officer Edward Malus (Nicolas Cage) who has been invited by his ex-fiancée, Willow (Kate Beahan) to the island she lives on to investigate the disappearance of her daughter, Rohan (Erika-Shaye Gair). What he finds there though is a matriarchal cult that has an active disdain of his sex, and are very much in tune with the bees and their hives that they tend to upon the island.

Kate Beahan as Willow

He starts his investigation but more and more feels as though he is being deceived by the women, including Sister Beech (Diane Delano) who runs the inn, both Sisters Rose and Thorn (both played by Molly Parker) and after being stung by a bee, of which he is deathly allergic to, the local doctor, Dr. Moss (Francis Conroy).

He eventually gets to meet the one who is in charge of the island, Sister SummersIsle (Ellen Burstyn), but he feels even she is not being honest with him and they are all impeding his investigation.

Real or fantasy?

What is the secret of the island? Is he really there to investigate a girl’s disappearance or are more sinister plots at play?

This unfortunately, is the film that turned Cage from being a competent actor in roles suited to his acting style, to a meme, something he has more or less played off ever since… even to the point when I told non-horror fans of my intention to do this review, it was met with ‘The bees… THE BEEEEEEEEEES!!’ The meme-ification of Cage has even resulted in a film dedicated more-or-less to it in The Unbearable Weight of Massive Talent, a film that I feel pulls the piss out of Cage to his bare face.

He’s getting paid and he’s getting exposure so why would he be bothered by that?

In LaBute’s favour, as I previously stated, this film is beautifully shot and has some outstanding set pieces that are like paintings of midwestern American landscapes. He wrote and directed the film and some of the decisions made with the script just seemed ‘Hollywooded’ with romantic links rather than simply a police officer performing his duty. I guess with the policeman being particular to the states and having no power in a different state makes sense due to jurisdiction, but it feels ingenuous.

The story that LaBute has crafted is very much showing that Cage’s intrusion into the matriarchal society is not welcome certainly feels like a man has written something that is supposed to be perceived having some feminist roots, but at no point does it ring true, and in actual fact, the women of the island seem cruel in their command of the society rather than fair, and giving we the viewer no opportunity to be sympathetic.

I’m a fan of Nicolas Cage! Hell, I wouldn’t have a whole month dedicated to him on my site if I didn’t have some kind of affection for him, but I know that his acting style is all about hysteria. He’s the kooky-eyed madman in every film he’s in, that’s his schtick, but it’s hard to replace the pious subtlety of Edward Woodward’s performance from the first film in that manner. It’s not just that though; Woodward’s low-key performance would have worked here really well, but Cage’s performance is arrogant and unpleasant. He treats the entire populace of the island with utter disdain when it’s supposed to be suspicion. It just doesn’t work. LaBute’s intention was possibly to make him seem so intrusive but it comes across as unlikable and abrasive.

I can’t see in this film where my sympathy is supposed to lie: the suspicious and unlikable women of the island, the jerk stranger in a strange land or the poor child who has disappeared, who we don’t really get to know.

It’s at this stage I must point out how awfully obvious the use of the name ‘Malus’ is, both with its use of the ‘male’ sound and the fact that it’s Latin for ‘harmful’, and the hamfisted tribute to Edward Woodward in Malus’ first name and Willow’s surname. Unnecessary and, dare I say it, amateurish.

Sadly, this does nothing to defend the honour of good remakes, and is a terrible shame as there are some great opportunities for some great female characters that are just overwhelmed by Cage’s descent into an Instagram meme.

Menu Screen

Extras: A total of three extras on this disc.

Cast and Crew commentary is with LaBute, Lynette Meyer (Costume designer), Joel Plotch (Editor), Beahan and Sobieski. It’s a pretty thorough and interesting commentary. It is interesting insomuch as the unusual decisions that were made with character motivations and some other ideas that don’t work in the slightest.

Alternate ending. Meh.

There are also trailers for Ghost Rider and Perfect Stranger.

Film:2/10

Extras:

Rewatchability: 0/10

THE BEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEES

Purchased from JB Hifi

LONGLEGS (2023)

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The cover to the Australian 4K release

LONGLEGS (2023)

Longlegs had this bizarre and magical air about it when it was released. I hadn’t heard a word spoken about it and suddenly social media was a-buzz about it. Was it because Nicholas Cage had become such a meme that to see him actually perform in a film was a surprise to people who aren’t aware of any of his work before The Unbearable Weight of Massive Talent?

Go and watch 8MM now!

I admit that I found that it was magical as well, as it took me 4 goes to stay awake through the whole thing. The spell of boredom it cast was such that it took me that many goes to sit through it.

Longlegs was written and directed by Osgood Perkins, not just the writer/ director of I Am The Pretty Thing That Lives In The House but also something I didn’t know until writing this review, is the son of Psycho’s Tony Perkins and starred in Legally Blonde as David!!

Maika Monroe as Agent Lee Harker

Longlegs tells the tale of FBI Agent Lee Harker (Maika Monroe) who, after a disastrous door to door investigation that saw her partner shot, has an evaluation that discovers her to be a little bit psychic.

Nic Cage as Longlegs

She is partnered with Agent Carter (Blair Underwood) and is put on the Longlegs case, which sees a group of families getting a visit from a person who calls themselves Longlegs (Nic Cage) and soon after the father cracks, kills the family and then himself… but why, and what does it have to do with the child of the family’s birthday? After being visited anonymously during the night with a key to the Zodiac Killer-styled notes being left, Harker seems to somehow be involved, or is she? And why are these bizarre dolls left behind at the victim’s houses?

One of the murderous victims

This film ticked all the boxes for me: serial killer, police investigation, a little bit of cult craziness, some interesting choices of casting and cinematography and yet I found it a slog to get through. It felt like someone had discovered all my favourite foods and had decided that I’d like to eat them all together in a big silver bucket with a wafer-thin wafer for desert… but unlike my suggested Mr Cruseau, it did not split me open in a painful and difficult vomitous birth: it put me to sleep.

All through the film I felt there was an ingenuous homage/ parody of Silence of the Lambs, but instead of Jodie Foster’s uncomfortable take on being a woman in a ‘man’s’ environment, the main character of Harper is more like Ed Norton in Red Dragon: flat, emotionless, clinical… almost dispassionate in its performance. This made her unlikable and distracting and I even found her performance to just be an emulation of Holly Hunter in Copycat (remember that one?). The similarities to Silence of the Lambs even resonates down to the mildly effete sanitarium operator, helped to muddy its identity. They do address the aforementioned woman in a man’s world situation Harker is in, but it’s a ham-fisted take, and not at all subtle like Jonathon Demme’s film.

I found Cage’s performance to be quite interesting, but the awful make up kept distracting me . I think it would have been far more effective and less like a parody if he had been able to use his own, far more interesting face rather than this terrible prosthetics which even blocks his performance a little. Honestly, Alicia Witt as Harker’s mother’s physical transformation is far more surprising and interesting that Cage’s.

I have to say I get that cinema is about mood, but much like my beloved CSI and Criminal Minds TV series’s, I’m sure these crimes could be solved a lot faster if the investigators TURNED THE LIGHTS ON!!

Ahem, excuse me.

Here’s an interesting twist though: it all pays off in the third act. If you can make it through the first two acts, the pay off is pretty good… not excellent, and maybe not even worth the laborious first two acts, but it does come good. Even better, a rewatch reveals a lot of answers that out of context you flat out would never guess.

I have a constant craving for a horror film that is original and bucks the trend of the usual sort of mainstream crap that cinema goers, streamers, and physical media purchasers are subject to… this isn’t the solution, but it’s a step in the right direction.

Most really good horror movies can leave you with a sleepless night, but for me, Longlegs is a CURE for a sleepless night, that pulls itself up at the end… if you can stay awake to it. I hate to be the guy that tells you, like I was told about many TV shows, that by the sixth episode it gets good… I want to be hooked from the start, not by the time I’ve started to lose interest.

The menu screen for Longlegs

Extras: Only one extra, which is a commentary by Perkins, and it’s thorough and he clearly loves the process of filmmaking. Worth a listen.

Film: 4/10

Extras: 4/10

Rewatchability: 6/10

One of the bizarre dolls left at the victims’ houses.

This film was reviewed with the Australian 4K release purchase from JB Hifi

Renfield (2023)

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The Australian Bluray release of Renfield

Renfield (2023)

Disc: Of all the things in the world I never though I’d need, like an underwater car, or a parrot, or skydiving lessons, Nicholas Cage as Dracula was certainly amongst them, but now I’m starting to look at that list… do I want to drive underwater, would a pet bird be fun and is plummeting to my almost certain death from an aeroplane things I DO need, because Cage as Dracula is most definitely something that made me happy.

Renfield was written by Ryan Ripley, based on a treatment by Invincible and The Walking Dead’s Robert Kirkman, and was directed by Chris McKay, best known as the director of the incredibly popular The Lego Batman Movie (2017). Is he the right guy for a horror movie? Well no, but he is certainly right for this amusing look at Dracula and his henchman Renfield.

This film has an interesting take of the legend of Dracula as its told from the point of view of his interred assistant, Renfield (Nicholas Hoult).

Hoult as Renfield

This tale takes place in modern day, and after a small recounting of his life as Dracula’s slave (told with some fun deep-fakery with Bela Lugosi’s Dracula film from the 30s) we get stuck right into it as we find Renfield at a support group in New Orleans. This support group is one to help those in abusive relationships, and whilst Renfield initially uses it as a way to find people who ‘deserve’ to be fed to Dracula, he finds some of the stories resonating and that he himself is in an abusive relationship with his master.

Cage as Dracula

Before that though, we find Renfield helping one of the group members who has been abused by her drug dealer boyfriend, who has stolen drugs from the Lobo crime family. On the same night he goes to get him to feed Dracula, the son of the crime family matriarch, Teddy (Ben Schwartz) has delivered an assassin to kill the dealer/thieves and so Renfield finds himself in a three way fight.

By the way, I should point out that Renfield gains temporary super powers whenever he eats a bug, which leads to some funny and gross moments in the film.

The resulting bloodshed results in the police getting involved, and we find cop Rebecca (Awkwafina) hot on the tail of Teddy, to try and avenge her father, a cop killed by the Lobo family.

Awkwafina as Rebecca

Renfield quickly finds an ally in Rebecca and in response, and in a petty relationship moment that many of us have endured, Dracula finds himself as a volunteer in the Lobo crime family! So what happens when a crime family, the police and an ancient evil collide? Bloodshed, of course… lots and lots of it.

I like to say I am not a big fan of the horror/ comedy sub-genre, but considering I rate Return of the Living Dead, Shaun of the Dead and Reanimator high on my favourite movies list, I should probably stop saying that. Whilst Renfield doesn’t hit the heights of those three, it is a fun take of the legend of Dracula.

Nicholas Hoult as Renfield is obviously the prime character in the film, and he does the stuttering, doddering Englishman role to a T, to the point I occasionally thought he was doing an impression of Hugh Grant. His nervousness and jittery characterisation of Renfield is a fantastic juxtaposition to the super powered, blood machine that he becomes after eating a bug.

Nic Cage as Dracula is obviously the standout in the film. An actor who seemingly has become a conscious parody of himself in the past ten years has really shone him in this role, as he adapts so many affectations of various other Dracula films including Nosferatu, Bela Lugosi’s performance and even his own uncle’s Bram Stoker’s Dracula film from the 90s. He chews up every scene and delivers both the threat and the laughs with an equal amount of gusto. Honestly, the conscious parody has actually benefitted him in this performance.

Awkwafina is surprising in the cop role, riffing a little bit of Samuel L. Jackson (but there’s not Bats on a mother fucking Plane here) with her foul-mouthed, no nonsense, shouty, abusive, bullying cop. Her and Hoult share a few amazing action sequence too which stand out as high points in both the violence and the comedy stake.

On that: the film has a great look to it and the New Orleans backdrop for the crime family is fantastic. Many of the set pieces are perfect, including the Lobo family torture chamber, and the hospital that Renfield and Dracula have holed up in, abandoned after a major disaster but taking place of a gothic domicile and looking like a run down castle fits perfectly. The fight scenes are also spectacularly silly, and even have a Marvel/ superhero film ridiculousness to it, but with more blood than I care to even be able to understand. There’s SO much I’m sure, even after watching the making-of stuff, that at least some of it MUST have not been practical.

I can comfortably see this in a regular rotation in my re-watch list of films. It’s heaps of fun and tells an interesting tale about abusive relationships, and Cage’s Dracula is spectacularly amazing.

The Australian Bluray menu screen

We have a lot of extras on this Australian Bluray release.

There a big set of Deleted and Extended Scenes and a few Alternate Takes as well. As I usually say, the film was neither better nor suffered without them, and the takes used in the film were clearly the best.

Dracula UnCaged looks at Cage’s performance as Dracula, with commentary from co-stars and crew, along with his own affection for the role, based on a childhood love of Nosferatu (1922) and right through to being an adult fan of vampire films. Cage recounts his performance via his personal history with the craft of acting, and with that of his family’s experience with making vampire films.

Monsters and Men: Behind the Scenes of Renfield discusses at the motivation of the film, and its origins and execution. They breakdown everything from the look of the film to the costumes and everything else, all in under 15 minutes!

Stages of Rejuvenation is an interesting look at the make up effects on Cage’s face.

Flesh and Blood looks at the practical effects of the film which surprised me. I had to go back and rewrite a part of this very review because I assumed by the amount of blood that it was CGI and it wasn’t!

Fighting Dirty unpacks the ridiculous and amazing fight scenes that are scrappy and comic-booky but oh-so-violent in there execution!

The Making of a Deleted Scene: Renfield’s Dance is interesting but essentially superfluous as the sequence didn’t make it into the film. I appreciate that they included it as it would be frustrating for all involved if it didn’t get seen at all.

Feature Commentary with Producer Samantha Nisenboim, Screenwriter Ryan Ridley and Crew (they do list themselves at the beginning of the commentary but they shoot out there names so quickly I couldn’t catch them all) is spectacularly enthusiastic and really informative.

Did I mention it’s got some blood and gore in it?

Gone in Sixty Seconds (2000)

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Gone in Sixty Seconds (2000)

The cover to the Australian release on Blu of Gone in Sixty Seconds (2000)

Film: Here at the To Watch Pile, we love ourselves some Nicolas Cage; heck, last October we dedicated a whole month to his manic acting and freaky-deakiness! What a guy!

Add to this is my secret affection for car movies, which I guess is less secret now, which is weird considering I don’t like driving and don’t own a car. I’ve always been interested in car culture, not so much racing and that sort of thing, but car-related art, documentaries, even pinstriping and TV shows like Pimp My Ride. This of course means that movies that have cars as a part of their aesthetic appeal to me, then add Mr. Cage into the mix… I’m excited!

Gone in Sixty Seconds is the remake of the 1974 film, Gone in 60 Seconds, written and directed (and starring) H. B. Halicki, modernised by scriptwriter Scott Rosenberg, and directed by Dominic Sena, who directed the Hugh Jackman/ John Travolta thriller, Swordfish, and the comic adaptation of Whiteout, starring Kate Beckinsale.

Gone in Sixty Seconds tells the story of Kip Raines (Giovanni Ribisi) who has gone foul of the crime boss Raymond Calitri (Christopher Eccleston) and is going to kill him unless his brother, retired car booster Memphis (Nicolas Cage) can steal 50 cars, of Calitri’s choosing, in a single night, and have them delivered to the docks for export.

The Crew

Memphis gets in touch with his old crew, featuring Sway (Angelina Jolie), Sphinx (Vinnie Jones), Donny (Chi McBride), Otto (Robert Duvall), Tumbler (Scott Caan) and Kip’s new younger crew, Mirror Man (T. J. Cross), Freb (James Duval) and Toby (William Lee Scott) and they come up with an elaborate plan to execute the mission, but there is two things standing in their way.

The first is the interest they have sparked in their reuniting from the police, particularly Detectives Castlebeck (Delroy Lindo) and Drycoff (Timothy Olyphant), and the second is Eleanor (an exquisite Shelby Mustang GT500), a car that Memphis has never been able to successfully steal!

Eleanor

Will they get all the cars to the docks or will Calitri have Kip killed? Who cares, just show us more and more sexy cars!

This is a weird movie for what’s essentially car porn. Sena’s direction is more about the micro looks at the cars, and even though you do get to see most of the cars, it’s prominently at night, so they are shown with a lot of reflection and instead the director has gone with close up of the interiors and the drivers. I guess in a movie that is quite heavily character driven and with so many personalities, that is just as important.

The story is actually a lot of fun and holds up, and I was so surprised to find that it was over 20 years old, well, until I saw how young everyone in it looks! There’s some clunky dialogue but it really adds to the cartoony feel of the whole thing. Even as a movie about crime, this doesn’t have the weight of a serious crime movie that shows that crime doesn’t always pay, but tries to give a warning about crime with an unexpected serious moral quote towards the end, which is like those awful pieces of moralising found at the end of a Masters of the Universe cartoon.

The performances are uneven, which is to be expected when three generations of actors ply their trade together, and it makes for some really silly moments, especially when you combine it with the already clunky dialogue, and I guess that’s where the charm of this lies.

One thing that does really irritate me about this film is the whole film builds up to this one amazing car stunt, that for some reason isn’t wholly a real stunt but instead appears to be a pretty average act of CGI shenanigans. When you consider car porn films lead up to ‘The Big Stunt’, this was a bit of a slap in the face.

Over and above that, cars and Cage: what a double! For me, even though I know it’s pretty bad, but it’s the most guiltiest of pleasures.

Score: **

There’s no menu screen on this disc, except for this pop-up menu.

Extras: All that car porn and so few extras! This is a fairly early disc in the Bluray format that was released for the film, so it weirdly goes straight to the movie and you have to access the extras via your pop-up menu. Even then, all that effort doesn’t result in a very interesting watch.

First we have some film highlights which are just a few of the more unbelievable scenes from the film, and the other is titled The Big Jump, which is a three minute making-of but about the really epic car stunt that occurs towards the end of the film.

Lame.

Score: *

WISIA: This film weirdly has a special place in my heart. It’s so stupid that I can just watch it again and again.

Christopher Eccleston as Raymond Calitri

Willy’s Wonderland (2021)

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Willy’s Wonderland (2021)

The cover to the Australian release Bluray of Willy’s Wonderland

Film: Nicolas Cage has had an interesting career… highs like Con Air and Face/Off, and lows like the Wicker Man remake, and then there is the absolute batcrap crazy stuff that he has been putting his name to since about 2018. It seems that the man has become the meme, and do I have a problem with that?

HELL no! If there is one thing that upgraded-hair Nic Cage can do, and do like NO ONE else can, it’s batcrap crazy, and in a fantastic move, filmmakers have decided that employing Cage the Meme is a far better idea, and the films being released with him in it have just been nothing short of odder than the loose sock box and a thrift store.

Willy and the Janitor face off… pun intended.

Willy’s Wonderland is the product of the mind of screenplay writer G. O. Parsons and director Kevin Lewis and boy-oh-boy, if all you want in 90 minutes of Cage not speaking and beating 5 different colours of oil out of some Five Nights at Freddy’s styled robots, you’re in for a treat.

If you are looking for a sensible and intelligent script with the absolute pinnacle of acting and special effects so real you can’t tell them apart from reality, you may not enjoy this… actually, why are you reading this at all?!?

Nic Cage played a character only known as ‘The Janitor’, a silent loner with an addiction to soft drinks, who’s pretty damned cool car is crippled when he comes across some police road spikes. The local mechanic/ tow truck driver, Jed (Chris Warner) only takes cash and his in-house ATM is down, so what will our hero do?

Luckily for him, owner of local burger joint Willy’s Wonderland, Tex Macadoo (Ric Reitz), has a proposition: clean up the restaurant overnight, and he’ll cover the costs of the repairs of his vehicle.

Our hero reluctantly agrees, and discovers two things about the restaurant. The first is that it’s condition is best described as ‘absolutely disgusting) and second, IT’S FILLED WITH ANIMATRONIC ROBOTS MADE FOR CHILDREN’S PARTIES BUT NOW JUST PROGRAMMED TO KILL, KILL, KILL!!!

The Janitor’s night of cleaning quickly becomes a night of violent survival, and the potential for carnage escalates when you include a bunch of local kids, headed up by Liv (Emily Tosta), who are trying to burn the place down, and the local constabulary, Sheriff Lund (Beth Grant), who seems to have secrets and motivations, involving a cult of serial killers, that are revealed as our story unfolds…

My first thoughts on this film was ‘oh crikey, what a rip off’ when you consider it’s similarity to Scott Cawthorn’s 2014 video game Five Night at Freddy’s, which tells a less violent version of the same story, and even 2019’s The Banana Splits movie, which tells a comparable tale, but with a much-loved kids TV show at its core. Realistically, it could have also been described as a homage to John Swartzwelder’s 1994 episode of The Simpsons, in which the robot entertainment of Itchy and Scratchyland goes haywire and start attacking the staff and visitors to the park, which in itself was a homage to many sources, including Jurassic Park and The Terminator. What we can definitely say though is all of these things owe their existence to Westworld.

That thought, long though it may seem, stopped pretty quickly once this film REALLY kicked off. We’ve ALL seen performances by Nic Cage where we have thought ‘now that’s something unusual’ but this performance hit the highest mark on the Owen Wilson WOW-ometer. His character has some form of mental diversity which keeps him relatively silent, set to a timer and probably more mechanical than the robots from the restaurant, which is possibly the point.

Weirdly, the accompanying cast are great support to our silent, but violent hero. Beth Grant, a character actor of the highest order whose IMDb reads like a list of every TV series of the past 20 years, but is probably best known as the dreadful Kitty Farmer from Donnie Darko gets a much deserved lead in this movie. Emily Tosta as Liv is probably a standout as well, as she shows probably far more intensity than the film deserves, and is easily the least caricature-like, unlike her friend group who just tick off the generic horror film checklist. I must admit to liking the character played by Caylee Cowan, truly a traditional horror bimbo of the highest order but I’ve followed the actor on Instagram for a while so it was nice to finally see her in a role, a small as it was.

Caylee Cowan goes full-horror bimbo in this flick.

Speaking of generic, it may have been on purpose and a parody of a lot of the Chuck-E-Cheese wannabe places in the US, but whilst the characters stood out from each other, but didn’t really have any sort of their own definition, and so were a little forgettable. I can honestly only name three of them right now after finishing the movie just a few hours ago.

Weirdly, this silent hero vs robot cartoon characters actually works. I can honestly say that when the movie finished, I immediately wanted to see what The Janitor’s next adventure would be, and I’m totally on board for a sequel.

Score: ****

The menu screen to the Australian Bluray release

Extras: Only trailers for Willy’s Wonderland, Bill and Ted Face the Music, Parasite, Guns Akimbo, and Upgrade.

Score: *

WISIA: I think it might wear thin quite quickly, but right now I want to watch it again.

This film was reviewed using the Australian release Bluray.

The weird Tinkerbell-styled character

Ghost Rider: Spirit of Vengeance (2011)

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Ghost Rider: Spirit of Vengeance (2011)

The cover to the Australian Bluray release

Film: Marvel comics of the 70s were some of the best comics ever made, and I really dig everything they did at that time. Actually, Marvel were heavily influenced by cinema at this time as they had their horror characters, their blaxploitation characters (like Power Man and Black Goliath), chop socky guys (like Shang Chi and Iron Fist) and their supernatural line, which included Satana, Man Thing and this guy, Ghost Rider.

OK, so I am the guy who liked the first Ghost Rider film: I need to point that out straight away. I am aware that that may have some of you not read my reviews at all anymore, but for any of its faults: it had the fucking GHOST RIDER in it… oh, and Eva Mendes in some outfits that were so tight you can almost count the hairs on her… well, they were pretty tight.

This new production, under the Marvel Knights line (a lower budget, more violent, less mainstream part of Marvel films) was directed by the team of Brian Taylor and Mark Neveldine, who brought us the Crank films and Gamer and written by Scott M. Gimple (episodes of The Walking Dead), Seth Hoffman (episodes of House and Prison Break) and David S. Goyer (Dark City and the Blade films… amongst others).

Nicolas Cage as Johnny Blaze

This reboot of the Ghost Rider tale sees Johnny Blaze (Nicolas Cage), the alter ego of the demon motorcyclist Ghost Rider approached by Moreau (Idris Elba), who is working for a religious order to stop the devil in his human guise Roarke (Ciaran Hinds) from kidnapping a boy, Danny (Fergus Riordan) from his mother Nadya (Violante Placido) for his own hidden reasons. Of course, Roarke has a mercenary working for him named Ray Carrigan (Johnny Whitworth) whose efforts to get the boy are assisted by a gift, a dark, evil gift…

… and then throw in Highlander Christopher Lambert as a tattooed religious fanatic and you have an absolute blast!!!

This film had a lot lower budget than the previous outing, but it is such a different film, with such a different vibe that a larger budget possibly would have been detrimental to the dirty look it achieved. The look of the main character, Ghost Rider, and his motorcycle, are so much fierier than in the first film. The skull is charred and the fire belches a thick polluting smoke that is echoed in the emissions from the motorcycle as well. His leathers aren’t smooth like in the first film, they bubble and pop, giving the fire real weight and you can almost feel the heat from it.

The Ghost Rider on his flaming hellcycle!

Most of the performances in the film are good, except, I hate to say it, for Cage’s. He is supposed to be a man haunted by a demon within, but sometimes it leans into vaudevillian which doesn’t really suit parts of the film.

The story is a little generic, and plot points will jump out at seasoned film goers well before they happen. That is not to say there aren’t some interesting moments (keep your eye out for a tribute to Pink Floyd’s Wish You Were Here, a joke about Twinkies’ use by dates and the Ghost Rider ‘hellifying’ a gigantic piece of digging equipment) but the direction is the hero here. Taylor and Neveldine deliver their hectic style seen in the Crank films, which suits the character perfectly and is a blast to watch.

Missed opportunity for comic geekdom department: there is a son of Satan in this and they didn’t call him Damien Hellstrom? Marvel fans will know what I mean!!

A pretty good film that is slightly better than the first film due to the manic direction and maniac performances. It knows its limitations, attempts to exceed them and does so well. Comic fans should dig it.

Score: ***1/2

The menu screen of the Australian Ghost Rider: Spirit of Vengeance Bluray

Extras: Straight up I want to say one thing that pissed me off about this release. Columbia, in their wisdom, has decided to release two different Bluray releases of this film: one has the 3D and 2D versions on two discs, and the other version has the 2D version, a DVD and a digital copy… so why not a combo of all?!? I like my digital copies of films, and whilst I don’t have a 3D TV, I like to get the 3D versions in case I get one in the future, so what do I buy here? What will end up happening are probably both, or I’ll download a digital copy from iTunes. Either way: Columbia are bastards.

Due to this, I was unable to watch the Riding Into Another Dimension 3D Featurette as it was on the 3D disc and unwatchable on my equipment… sorry!

The Path to Vengeance is a great 6 part documentary looking at the trials that Neveldine and Taylor and their cast and crew had to getting this made. It’s an interesting look at filmmaking in Eastern Europe and the director’s take the whole thing with a great sense of humour.

The Deleted Scenes are cool: essentially unnecessary but interesting if only for the semi-finished CGI featured in them.

Director’s Expanded Video Commentary is the best director’s commentary ever. It features Taylor and Neveldine standing in front of the film and commenting, stopping the film for ‘making of footage’ and picture in picture stuff with alternate shots and making of bits. It’s a really interesting and innovative commentary that has a wry sense of humour as well. It does; however, double up on some of the info given in the The Path to Vengeance doco.

Score: ****

WISIA: Probably just after watching the first one, so yeah, I’d watch it again.

Johnny Whitworth as Blackout

This review was done with the initial Australian Bluray release

Ghost Rider (2007)

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Ghost Rider (2007)

The cover to the Australian release of Ghost Rider

Film: I am a massive fan of the ‘comic-movie’. Having read comics for over the past 40 odd years, I’m interested in any comic to film adaptation, be it a lowbrow comedy like High School Confidential, or a super budgeted blockbuster-y extravaganza like the Juggernauts that are the Marvel and DC products that we see today. I am always interested to see filmmakers takes on characters from my favourite literary art-form. Sometimes they can be super-duper adaptations, like Sin City, or Captain America Winter Soldier…and sometimes they can be Judge Dredd (the Stallone one, not the Urban one): either way, I am always keen to see where the producer’s will take a popular (or in some cases unpopular) license.

One thing I never understand though is unnecessary changes. Do some of these filmmakers feel a need to personalise a character for the sake of the audience, or is it for more egotistical reasons that makes them want to feel the character is their own? Ghost Rider is another example of unnecessary changes, but lucky for me most of it worked.

Ghost Rider tells the tale of Johnny Blaze (Matt Long) who, as a youngster, sold his soul to the Devil (Peter Fonda) in exchange for the life his father, a cycle stunt rider who has been diagnosed with lung cancer and is dying. The Devil, of course, cures him, but allows him to die in a motorcycle accident, which causes Johnny to become hellbent on self destruction, including throwing away a relationship with the lovely Roxy (Raquel Alessi).

Nicolas Cage as Johnny Blaze

Flash forward to now, and Johnny (now played by Nicolas Cage) is still trying to destroy himself, until he meets up with Roxy (now played by Eva Mendes) again. He tries to re-ignite their love, but is unaware that the Devil’s son Blackheart (Wes Bentley) is challenging his father’s rule, and that the Devil will soon call upon Johnny to fulfill his contract with him, by becoming his demonic hitman on Earth, which will no doubt play havoc with any potential of a personal life. After a chance meeting with the Caretaker (Sam Elliott), who seems to know more about his curse than he is letting on, Johnny learns how to use the powers of… THE GHOST RIDER!!

My biggest problem with this film was some of the characterizations. Nic Cage as Johnny Blaze was great… never before have I seen an actor play a two dimensional character so well, and his emotions swung from moody to brooding to angst-ridden with ease. Eva Mendes was wonderful as a cleavage that could speak. Seriously, I don’t think I heard a single world that came out of her mouth, as her role is a purely visual one!! Wes Bentley as Blackheart… well let’s just say that one of comic artist John Romita Jr’s most wonderful visual images was adapted into a skinny emo boy, and didn’t necessarily feel as oppressive and evil as he was in the comics.

Eva Mendez as Roxanne

Now though, we get to the performance cream, Peter Fonda as the Devil was inspired, and his longing looks at the motorbike were a grand harking back to his Easy Rider days. I suspect though, that his portrayal of Satan may be quite easy for him, and I suspect he may have been playing himself, as is Sam Elliott’s take on the gravelly, tobacco-chewin’ Caretaker.

As far as the film itself is concerned, it is a great time, if you don’t take it too seriously. Many movies rely on more than the stars abilities and this is one of them. The special effects are nothing short of brilliant! Anyone who goes to a film that features a burning demon riding a hog, who fights with a semi-sentient chain and doesn’t have a good time…well, perhaps you should be reading the reviews at Disney’s website. This review, as the title says, is for the extended version of the film, and to be quite honest, I couldn’t tell what scenes were extra ones! I saw this film at the cinemas, and the extras scenes don’t change the film, like say the extended cut of the Daredevil film, but just add to the scenes already there, like the extended cut of the Fantastic Four film.

There’s probably only one real unforgivable sin committed by this film, and that is that it’s Rebel Wilson’s first appearance in a movie. Truly scary.

While the performances may have been lacking somewhat, every time that flaming skeleton riding a Harley with burning tires comes onto the screen, you tend to forgive and forget.

Score: ***

The menu screen to Ghost Rider

Extras: After the fantastic extras on the DVD 2-disc set, these are somewhat disappointing.

There are 2 commentaries, both of which are interesting looks at the making of and ideas behind this film. The first is performed by director Mark Steven Johnson, and visual effects supervisor Kevin Mack, and the second is by producer Gary Foster. Also on this first disc are trailers for Spider-Man 3 and Stomp the Yard.

The next features on the disc are a series of Makings of. The first is titled Spirit of Vengeance, which deals with mainly the nuts and bolts of the making of this film, and showcases some of the locations in Melbourne Victoria, where the majority of this film was made. The second is titled Spirit of Adventure, which showcases the stunts of the film, and the last is titled Spirit of Execution, which is all about the post production of the film. All in all these come together to make a complete making of production, and feature interviews with Nicolas Cage, Eva Mendes, Sam Elliot, and many more, and are a complete look at the stuff needed to make a movie.

There’s also trailers for Spiderman 3 and Surf’s Up…. Yeah, this Bluray is THAT old!

Tragically, on the Bluray they have dumped the amazing 4 part doco about the comic book version of the character. A bad choice, in my opinion, as it was a thorough look at the character. Actually, these comic to movie docos seem to now be frequently absent from Bluray releases which is a damned shame.

Score: ***

WISIA: It has this weird irresistible charm that doesn’t require the knowledge of 30 different Marvel films to follow what’s going on. I’ll watch it again when I wanna watch Marvel but without the weight.

A victim of Wes Bentley’s Blackheart