#12 Face/Off

#12 Face/Off

Year: 1997

Director: John Woo

MPAA Rating:  R 

Epic Co-stars: John Travolta, Margaret Cho

Running Time: 138 mins.
Cage Time: 50%
Cage Kills: 13
Cage Flip-outs: 8

Martine's Review: I laughed.  I cried.  I dreamed of the slow sensual eating of a (my) peach for hours.  And that was just in the first 10 minutes.  Face/Off did more for me in 30 minutes than 10 Romantic-Comedies combined.  Nicolas Cage starts as Caster Troy, the most ruthless/sexiest super-villain to ever grace the planet earth.  Troy and his brother are terrorists for hire and are responsible for some of the most elaborate terrorist attacks in history.  Castor Troy constantly eludes his arch-nemesis Sean Archer (played by the totally love-handlishous John Travolta) who is a super secret government guy who basically can't even tell his wife what he has for lunch when he's at work.  A few really well thought out twists and turns later the two find themselves in each others bodies impersonating one another while also totally trying to execute their own agendas.  Wow, my juicy peach was on such a wild ride I didn't know up from down, left from right...


Two Nic Cages in one film?  This penetrated my psyche like nobody ever has before: double (psyche) penetration!  Cage as Archer softly tickled the freshly ripe side of my peach as I watched him perfectly portray a noble family man caught in the clutches of the seedy underworld of prison inmates and super-mega sex/drug lairs.  Initially I teared up when I saw Travolta crying out in pain after losing his child, but later when Cage had his turn at the same situation it was too much for me to handle.  I burst out into a full fit, whaling so loudly that my fellow viewers had to make frequent use of the pause button on the remote control.

Which one is Nicolas Cage?  Both of them.

Cage as Troy set ablaze my fully ripe and juicy side as he so confidently and joyously planned and executed mass destruction everywhere he went.  To see the way he cherished and charmed each and every lady he came into contact with made me feel just a drop of regret about the path my personal life has taken, the wife of an engineer who possesses less passion and sexual spontaneity in his entire body than Cage (as Troy, or anyone else for that matter) does in his little toe.

If this is what was waiting for me every Sunday I'd join the church choir in a second. 

With most films, looking beyond Nicolas Cage's performance is futile, but Face/Off still brings several strong and memorable points to mind.  John Woo dazzled me with sultry prison fights,  totally gross ears being shot off of guys heads, mystifying laser ear reconstruction and re-attachment to guys heads, hot guys getting faces lasered off, hot guys with other hotter guys faces, guys that used to be totally hot but now have no face and look totally sick, hot guys being shot by hotter guys with spear guns, totally rad sex/drug lairs with tons of people snorting coke and cussing up a storm, and high flying helicopter / jet / Hummer / boat chases that took my breath away.  I have to say the most heartwarming and simply beautiful moment of the film came during a quite innovative and imaginative music video of my all-time favorite song, "Somewhere over the Rainbow" performed by Olivia Newton-John.  The video exposes the sweet and almost beautiful innocence of a small child clutching a stuffed animal set to the even more beautiful back drop of tons of drugged-out maniacs murdering each other in the aforementioned totally rad drug/sex lair. 


All in all, I think Face/Off draws a close parallel to my own life.  The juxtaposition of my constant struggle between good and evil, my face's transformation from daughter to mother, or my slow but steady decent from a young and free barely-ripe peach into a slightly decayed and withered old piece of fruit trapped in a monotonous and thankless existence that reiterated daily by a loveless marriage and an empty relationship with a spoiled and unruly child.  Alas, at the end of the day none of this really matters because I know that at any point I can slip off my shoes, put in my VHS version of Face/Off, a get double penetrated by Nic Cage for two solid hours which is all a girl like me really wants or needs.

Movie quotability: 5/5

• "You know, I can uh... eat a peach for hours."
• "Goddammit! Don't play chicken with a goddamn jet!"
• "You're not having any fun, are you, Sean?"
• Troy: "Well, I have got to go. I've got a government job to abuse, and a lonely wife to fuck." [Archer sobs] Troy: "Oh, sorry... make love to."
• "I want to take his face... off."
• Dr Walsh: "What do you want?" Troy: "Take one god damn guess."
• "It's like looking in a mirror, only... not."
• Troy [reading Archer's wife's diary] "'Date night, fizzled again. We haven't had sex in two months.' ...what a loser."
• "This nose, this hair... this ridiculous chin."
• "Dress up like Halloween, and ghouls will try to get in your pants."
• "Oh well, Plan B. Let's just kill each other."

Plot Holes:
Basically the whole movie, including- 

• John Travola can drive as fast as a jet in a Humvee, and fly faster than a jet in a helicopter. 
• Your face can be pulled off like ham off a sandwich, not to mention stuck on someone else's skull and make them look exactly like you.
• Archer isn't allowed to tell ANYONE about switching faces with Troy (conveniently setting himself up to get screwed later). 
• Wife woken by husband coming home super late for work and wants to have sex with him. 
• After taking his face, the feds keep Castor Troy's body alive for no apparent reason.
• Nic Cage sent to prison as Troy to get info from Pollux, although it seems like they could have just set up a brief meeting to accomplish the same purpose.
• People heal superfast from facial surgery.
• Archer has been following Troy for years, but how does Troy know about Archer's family?
• Archer (as Troy) could still save everyone by telling the cops about the bomb at the Convention Center. 
• Prison has "System Overload" button.

	CAGEamatic	Cinematic
Skyler	Outstanding	Outstanding
Shauna
James	4.44	4.13
Martine	!Did Her Nails and Read Her Book in the Cage!

#11 Trapped in Paradise

#11 Trapped in Paradise

Year: 1994

Director: George Gallo

MPAA Rating:  PG-13 

Epic Co-stars: Jon Lovitz, Dana Carvey

Running Time: 111 mins.

Cage Time: ~95%

Cage Kills: 0

Cage Flip-outs: 8

Skyler's Review: You may think that a lighthearted Christmas comedy starring Nic Cage can only be great, a must see, even. This was my original thinking, too. However, now I am fully aware that there are really only three reasons to put this movie on your television:

1. You are trying to complete the A Year In the Cage challenge. 
2. You actually want to go to the park, but you can't quite get up the motivation.
3. You hate yourself.

For me, it was the first one. Although, by the end it may have been the third one. The feeling that I had during the movie was similar to how I felt toward the end of the Lord of the Rings: this movie is good, but why is it so, so long? Except this movie isn't good. 

This picture, right-to-left was like the movie. Off to an OK start, exudes excellence in the middle, and (like Dana Carvey's career) goes on far too long in the end.

This isn't to say that this movie didn't have some funny moments. Nicolas Cage delivers an impeccable performance that is funny and nuanced. Juxtapose this with Dana Carvey's performance which was on par with his usual caliber, i.e. awful. If you are deciding to watch this film, and you want to finish it (so, you are not watching for reason #2), don't make the dreadful mistake that we did. Hide all of your clocks, remove your watch, disable any alarms. Our mistake was that when the movie felt like it was about over, a member of our group needed to go to the toilet. In keeping with the rules of A Year in the Cage, we paused the movie...revealing the actual time remaining in the movie: 45 minutes! (gasp) Shear willpower kept us going. It was like living out the scene from A Clockwork Orange.

Please, Dana; look into my shades, and Never. (point fingers into air suddenly) Speak. (open hands violently) Again. (throw arms down quickly)

OK so now you know how I feel about the film, let's go over the premise of this movie. Jon Lovitz and Dana Carvey are getting paroled from jail, and straight-shooting Nic Cage has to pick them up. Cage knows that his brothers are up to no good and will have some sort of plan to rob or steal something. They trick Nic into driving them over state lines (parole violation) to rob a bank in the small town of Paradise, PA. Jon says some funny stuff about yoga, Nic flips out in a funny way, and Dana acts like an idiot. The three rob the bank and fix to leave, when (would you believe it!!!) they get trapped there due to snow. Jon talks about leaving, Nic talks about his moral compass, and Dana talks like a moron. Things happen; none of it really believable. People in the movie seem to like Dana Carvey's character. To make the movie more fun to watch, try predicting what is about to happen. The fun part is that you are always right; except Dana Carvey's character lives.

Movie quotability 1/5:

• "Yeeeeessss, I wanted to talk to her."

• "Edna?  Are we sleeping together?  I don't think so, you call me Mrs. Firpo!"

• "Oh my god a GUUUNNN!"

• "Why don't you let me do the crackin' and you do the jackin'"

• "But I swear we ain't the same people we were this morning."

Plot Holes:

• Everything about Dana Carvey's character.

• Local police have a gymnasium full of maps and charts within a couple hours of the robbery.

• Three idiot brothers walk away unharmed from what would otherwise be a fatal car accident.

• Dumbest bank manager/manager's wife don't recognize three strangers with very distinct voices.

• A relatively still stream suddenly turns into a waterfall the second someone falls out of the boat.

• A horse pulling a sleigh can travel up the freeway at the same speed as a car.

• Morons think they need to put the money back in the vault rather than placing it right outside the door... or anywhere else in or near the fucking bank! 

	CAGEamatic	Cinematic
Skyler	Outstanding	Dreadful
Shauna
James	3.62/5	1.7/5
Martine	!Trapped in the Cage!

#10 Knowing

#10 Knowing

Year: 2009

Director: Alex Proyas

MPAA Rating:  PG-13 

Epic Co-stars: None

Running Time: 121 mins.
Cage Time: ~95%
Cage Kills: 0
Cage Flip-outs: 5

James' Review:  As the movie opens Cage plays a genius professor and loving single father, but over the next two hours this character slowly transforms into the half cocked, moderately insane, and partially psychotic person that is in every great Cage character.  The fun begins when Cage receivers a page full of rambling numbers that has recently been unearthed from a time capsule at his sons school.  He applies his genius to this page and can suddenly predict every major natural disaster including the biggest/worst one ever that is coincidentally coming in rather short period of time.  

Nouveau Shamonic + Total Destruction = Classic cage goodness.

In addition to a decently solid Nouveau Shamanic performance, Knowing contains several pretty awesome action / destruction sequences.  One of which has an impressive series of helpless people suffering as they burn to death.  In the end, the plot-line goes a bit flat as it tires  (and fails) to tie up some loose ends, but this is all forgiven with the onset of one of the coolest end-of-days sequences I've seen in quite a long time.  

Even Nic Cage himself is shocked by the beauty of his own hair in this film.

In addition to the epic destruction, Nic Cage's hair borderlines on perfection during almost every second of the film.  Sporting one of the deepest, most puffy hairlines in all of show business,  his hair often resembles a beautiful and majestic bird with light weightless feathers.  This hair, coupled with some of the most intensely concerned facial expression around, allows Nicolas Cage to easily be mistaken for a god on the big screen.  But after several minutes of reflection one will come to the realization that this is not a case of mistaken identity, that your eyes haven't deceived you, that Nicolas Cage TRULY IS GOD.

Movie quotability: 2/5

• "I think that shit just happens.  But that's just me..."
• "You stay away from us you hear?  You want some of this?" (hits tree with bat)
• "How am I supposed to stop the end of the world" (Diana gasps...

Plot Holes:

• Kid decides his hearing aid sucks and can suddenly hear without having his hearing aid in.  (Nonsense disability)
• Supposedly "good mom" puts her daughter in the front seat of her car and races away like a maniac in her Mazda 3.  Leaves children in car multiple times.
• "micro-teslas" are not a unit of solar radiation.  And even if it was, it'd be totally insignificant to any other  magnetic field in our daily lives.
• A pay phone still exists in a gas station parking lot, and the 9 year old carries plenty of change.
• Black rocks?  WTF?

	CAGEamatic	Cinematic
Skyler	Exceeds Expectations	Poor
Shauna
James	3.71/5	3.29/5
Martine	!Stayed in the Cage!

#9 Trespass

#9 Trespass

Year: 2011

Director: Joel Shumacher

MPAA Rating: R 

Epic Co-stars: Nicole Kidman

Running Time: 91 mins.
Cage Time: 85%
Cage Kills: 1
Cage Flip-outs: 3

Shauna's Review: Home invasion thrillers are, as a genre, some of the best and most finely-wrought suspense films. Fighting it out with a gang of baddies on your home turf is both advantageous (you know the house better than they do) and unsettling (they've invaded your privacy, and your goddamn family is there, inevitably screaming/crying/basically useless). How will you use your wits to save your family and accidentally-on-purpose probably end up killing those bad guys? 

If you're thinking of your favorite home invasion movies at this point-- Panic Room, When a Stranger Calls, Wait Until Dark, Home Alone, etc-- it's probably best to set those thoughts aside before watching Trespass, because it's not going to hold up very well in the comparison. Subtly rising tension, clever plot twists, and ingenious foils are replaced with mostly a bunch of screaming, cursing, and crying. It reminded me of the one mortifying time I did improv in a high school drama class: given a quick series of scenarios, my friend and I were too nervous to come up with anything new and embarrassingly "acted" terrified in each new scene ("Aack! We're in a hot air balloon! Oh no! We're trapped on a ledge! Help us! We're stuck in a supermarket!"). The characters in this film's similarly static reactions to each new predicament dull your interest and your emotional investment as time goes on. It's probably realistic to imagine that people in this situation would mostly cry, threaten each other without follow-through, and scream f-bombs as often as possible, but that doesn't mean it's interesting to watch. 

"This is so upsetting!"
"I know! There aren't even any interesting screen shots from this movie!"

Nic Cage plays Harrison Ford's character from Firewall, except he looks like chubby, old Tom Hanks with Mr. Feeny glasses and has none of Ford's quiet resolve. Instead (have I mentioned?) he yells a lot. And cries. It's such a shame to have Cage in a role with nothing quotable to say and very little ass-kicking. I kept hoping for a dramatic shift in this film, but it just never came. My conclusion: in this type of movie, either the criminals or the victims have to be clever, preferably both. If both of them are making inexplicably stupid choices and no one is saying anything interesting... there's not much point in watching.

"Oh, my god... when will this movie be over?"
"I know, honey, I know... soon. Soon."

Movie quotability: 0/5

• "Shit fucking animals!"

Plot Holes:

• SPOILER: Nic Cage gets shot in the inner thigh but barely groans, much less bleeds to death  from his femoral artery. Later he walks with a teeny limp. 

	CAGEamatic	Cinematic
Skyler	Poor	Improvement Required
Shauna
James	2.3/5	2.5/5
Martine	!Stayed in the Cage!

#8 Season of the Witch

#8 Season of the Witch

Year: 2011

Director: Dominic Sena

MPAA Rating:  PG-13 

Epic Co-stars: Ron Perlman

Running Time: 95mins
Cage Time: ~95%
Cage Kills: 16 (allegedly 600 plus countless women, children, and wolves)
Cage Flip-outs: 1

Shauna's Review: Season of the Witch may not have been based on a video game, but it definitely could have been... or vice versa. Knights Behmen (Nic Cage) and Felson (Ron Perlman) cheerfully hack their way through a half-dozen 14th century Crusades until the fateful day the mists clear and they realize they've killed (attractive) women and children. Goddammit! After a pissy screaming match with their leader priest dude, they desert the army, principles intact. 

These principles weigh heavily upon my head, like... overly long hair and half a British accent.

A month later, they find themselves in the city of Marburg where a mysterious black plague (hmm) has taken hold. The woman deemed responsible has been labeled a bitch; I'm sorry, a witch, and needs to be taken to the monks for trial. As deserters, the soldiers face an indeterminate but ostensibly awful punishment; Cardinal Saruman offers them clemency for escorting the prisoner on this inevitably perilous journey. Nic Cage refuses (he has his principles, after all), but changes his mind when he sees how hot the witch is. Aww, she looks so innocent! Perhaps he can save her, thus redeeming himself after slaughtering all those women and children! The rest of the movie depicts their harrowing journey, as the men face evil, both physical and psychological, in their attempt to bring her to the monastery. 

In my next role, can I please play a wizard again? I'll even settle for Count Dooku.

Of course, in the first scene of the movie, we established that witches/magic/evil are totally real and definitely horrifying, so we won't spend too long wondering whether or not she's actually a witch. Plus, you know, she always has her stringy, dark hair hanging in front of her eyes and generally looks like the chick from The Grudge. Very subtle. 

I'm totally innocent... I don't know why you don't believe me.

Season of the Witch did not do very well in theaters; I remember seeing the previews and thinking it looked terrible. But it surprised me. It was both more creepy and more suspenseful than I had anticipated. The overall trajectory was predictable, but there were a number of surprising and interesting moments throughout. The film wasn't particularly strong in terms of Cage-y-ness. The dialogue is terse and largely unpretentious; the witty banter is mostly given to Perlman, and some of it is actually funny. As a result, this is Cage's straightest and most subdued performance so far... with surprisingly good result. This isn't the movie to watch if you're looking for Nouveau Shamanic mega-acting, but it is a solid adventure/suspense flick. 

Movie quotability: 1/5

• (Whacks girl on head) "Now she's sedated."
• "I've saved your ass a hundred times, have a little faith."
• "Did you see that priest's face? Looked like someone pissed in his holy water."

Plot Holes:

• The plague has something to do with demons.
• SPOILER: When waking up after having demons excised from your body, you just lie on the ground with your boobs pressed firmly against the floor. Boo! 

	CAGEamatic	Cinamatic
Skyler	Poor	Successful
Shauna
James	1.83/5	2.78/5
Martine	!Stayed in the cage!

#7 Moonstruck

#7 Moonstruck

Year: 1987

Director: Norman Jewison

MPAA Rating:  PG 

Epic Co-stars: Cher

Running Time: 102 mins.
Cage Time: 25%
Cage Kills: 0
Cage Flip-outs: 2

Skyler's Review: Every romantic comedy has some sort of love triangle, but Moonstruck takes this to the next level: a triangle made out of two brothers and Cher (the actually young Cher, not the "young-looking" Cher). Cher's character, Loretta, is acute woman who lost her husband due to bad luck. Johnny proposes but is a bit obtuse. Loretta then meets Ronny (The Cage), Johnny's brother, and also falls for him (c'mon, it's Nic Cage). Ronny is more adjacent, but she is engaged to Johnny. She hopes for a sine. Then there is a story-arctangent, about the moon, luck, love, and the moon for a secant time. That's right, triangle jokes in this review.

Looking beautiful, as always. Cher looks OK.

Studies have shown that RomComs actually have a negative impact on your relationships by setting up unrealistic expectations for love. This movie is quite the opposite. The entire theme of this movie is that relationships are messy; life is messy. People make decisions that impact the rest of their lives, but should you listen to your prefrontal cortex (brain) or your amygdala (heart)? Ronny is the amygdala, raw emotion. He could flip-out at any moment or start crying. Johnny is the prefrontal cortex, logic and planning, unfeeling. Loretta is Freud's concept of ego trying to weigh both and make a decision about life, love, and risk. 

"It is better to have hand and lost than never to have hand at all."

Loretta struggles to make her choice, but will she be happily ever after? Well, life isn't happy ever after. Flowers die. Puppies grow into dogs, then they die. Cars break and die. The sun will die. How do you find happiness in this context? You can close your eyes and get lost in the moment, but that lasts a moment. You can plan for decades into the future, but is planning happiness? It is better to have loved and lost than to never love at all.

Real-life involves shouting-matches at the kitchen table.

Regarding Cage's performance, he is stellar. He perfectly portrays a character that doesn't think at all. Emotional action and reaction. No regard to the future! You can see why Cher requested Nic Cage by name to play this part. There is only thing that could have made this film even better: more Cage time; however, this film is a great addition to any Nicolas Cage library.

Movie quotability:

• "Chrissy, bring the big knife I'm gonna cut my throat"
• "I lost my hand! I lost my bride! Johnny has his had! Johnny has his bride!"
• "Johnny, can I borrow that ring?"

Plot Holes:

• A liquor store in Brooklyn has a big heart shaped sign in the front window.
• The year is 1987, yet Ronny still has a wooden prosthetic hand.

	CAGEamatic	Cinematic
Skyler	Acceptable	Acceptable
Shauna
James	2.8/5	3.1/5
Martine	!Enjoyed her laptop in the Cage!

Avoid Cage Burnout!

Spending a year in the cage is not going to be easy for even the most die-hard fans.  Use the chart below to avoid Cage Burn-out!  For best results, never watch more than two movies in a row from the same quadrant.  This will ensure that you are constantly refreshed and amazed by Mr. Cage's amazing depth and breadth of range.  Sure the chart has some issues (Peggy Sue Got Married equally as serious as Lord of War or that Cameron Poe from Con Air is equally as Brilliant as H.I. McDunnough from Raising Arizona), but this chart can still be used as rough guide to the Cage Extremes.

The Cage Matrix from theShiznit.com:  A valuable tool to help you survive a year in the CAGE.

#6 Snake Eyes

#6 Snake Eyes

Year: 1998

Director: Brian De Palma

MPAA Rating: R 

Epic Co-stars: Gary Sinise

Running Time: 98 mins
Cage Time: ~85%
Cage Kills: 0
Cage Flip-outs: 3

James' Review: In Snake Eyes Nick Cage plays Rick Santoro, a highly annoying municipal police officer that any person not hopped up on cocaine wouldn't want to spend for than 5 seconds with; perfect Nouveau Shamanic material.  The film starts out with Cage excited as hell about a big time boxing matching and getting to watch it with his "best friend" Kevin Dunne (Gary Sinise) but things quickly go south as a very high ranking government official is shot and Santoro is left to decode several suspicious and somewhat nonsensical events that occurred leading up to the crime. 


As with many great Cage films, relationships such as "best friend", "wife", and "kids" are thrown into the plot in an attempt to convey the idea the the characters are fully mature human adults, but they come off as somewhat 1-dimensional on screen.  But let's be honest here, nobody gives a shit about that.  We just want to see some fine Cage Mega-Acting, and we're in luck for at least 50% of the movie.  While the middle half of the movie feels like a bit of a slump when it comes to eccentric Cagness, as the plot plows on and Cage is left in more and more precarious situations we see the Cage that we've come here for.  

Nic Cage plays one of the most convincing loud annoying assholes I've ever seen.

Snake Eyes brings a somewhat complex, well thought out crime scenario and some highly creative (yet poorly executed) cinematography to make it worth it's 98 minutes. As the film reaches it's climax, Nicolas Cage is in top form as a battered hero alone in the world with not a chance of survival.  Unfortunately, not even some top notch mega-acting could distract from the horrific script that almost seems like a parody of so many B-rate action / suspense films that have paved the path to this point.  Fortunately, anyone who has made it this far is no longer watching for the story, but watching to see Nicolas Cage transcend the realm of reality and entertain like only he can.  I'm happy to say we have not been let down.

Movie quotability: 2/5

• "You see where your hand is?  That a FELONY!"
• "And that's what she was there for, to give you a boner.  And you got one, congratulations you're human."

Plot Holes:

• Mystery chick is seemingly unaffected by her gunshot wound.
• SPOILER:  Even though the cops learned about the murders the city still decides to use pillers with dead bodies in them.

	CAGEamatic	Cinematic
Skyler	Outstanding	Acceptable
Shauna
James	3.77/5	2.88/5
Martine	!Enjoyed her Kindle in the Cage!