#50 Stolen

#50 Stolen

Year: 2012

Director: Simon West

MPAA Rating: R

Epic Co-stars: None.

Running Time: 93 minutes
Cage Time: 90%
Cage Kills: 0
Cage Flip-outs: 2

James' Review:  Let's just think for a moment about the one film in the last decade that you wished Nic Cage would have been in but wasn't.  Easy answer:  Taken.  Sure Liam Neeson is a total badass, but we all know Nicolas Cage would have an even more particular set of skills and would have found him and killed him just a bit sooner and more fantastically.  This is exactly what I was hoping this movie was, what it should be, but (very) unfortunately is not.  

Stolen was directed Simon West, who also directed Con Air.  Do you see the resemblance?

Cage is Will Montgomery, a master safe picker.  He is a career criminal in a gang of three that specializes in high value, high tech, and high profile bank robberies.  Montgomery needs to pull off one last heist to to build his nest egg to the point where he can retire and finally be the father that his seven year old daughter deserves.  What could go wrong?  Well actually, plenty of stuff and (spoiler alert) it does.  The aftermath involves Cage going to jail for just under a dime, the cute girl getting off scott free, and the ugly crazy guy (Josh Lucas) spiraling down and eventually getting killed in a fire.  Or did he....  (spoiler alert) No, actually he didn't.  He faked his death and  is totally pissed at Cage.  He wants his cut of the money from the heist and will take Cage's daughter and eventually kill her if he doesn't get it.  She is STOLEN!!!

Nic Cage plays a homeless man that sleeps on the street.  The sidewalk is his pillow...

Nic Cage has only one option: reunite with the Hot Chick and rob another bank to get enough ransom money.  The rest of the movie from here is the creepy ugly guy driving around talking on his cellphone, Cage's daughter spending a lot of time in a trunk, and Nic Cage being much less badass than Liam Neeson was until the end of course. 

Best. Most Mediocre. Movie. Ever.

Movie quotability:

• "Oh my god. You shot me."
• "I left the money. I have to get the money."
• "I'm not the squirrel playing with his nuts here."
• "I do have are a very particular set of skills; skills I have acquired over a very long career. Skills that make me a nightmare for people like you. If you let my daughter go now, that'll be the end of it. I will not look for you, I will not pursue you. But if you don't, I will look for you, I will find you, and I will kill you."
• "Who dat?"

Plot Holes:

• Nicolas Cage is way too tech savvy to have been in lockup for 8 years.
• Nicolas Cage walks away from a ridiculous car wreck that kills 2 FBI agents and runs away.
• Nicolas Cage is only knee deep in water, yet we see the taxi sink hundreds of feet.

	CAGEamatic	Cinamatic
Skyler	Acceptable	Poor
Shauna
James	3.09/5.00	1.59/5.00
Martine	!Pissed that 90 minutes of her life was STOLEN in the CAGE!

#4 Con Air

#4 Con Air

Year: 1997

Director: Simon West

MPAA Rating: R 

Epic Co-stars: John Malkovitch, Steve Buscemi, Dave Chapelle

Running Time: 115 mins
Cage Time: ~80%
Cage Kills: 6
Cage Flip-outs: 1

Martine's Review:  This movie was good enough for me to stay in the cage without too much fuss. Cage's hair was totally gross and was a super turn-off until I saw him in those 90's style tight jeans and the even tighter wife-beater tucked into them. Just seeing those oiled and powerful arms brought be right back to 11th grade when I used to stay up late in my room with a flashlight reading issues with Teen and Seventeen magazine finding every Nic Cage photo I could and hiding them under my pillow.  I found myself fantasizing that I was "Baby-O" and that Nic was risking his life to save me.  In my version instead of a shot of insulin from Nic, I got a HUGE shot of vitamin-C(age) which healed me in every way possible.

Totally gross prison hair :(

Totally sexy prison body :)

So what is Con Air? Well, you have a plane full of antisocial and sociopathic criminals who act accordingly, one stereotypically gay inmate, and a lot of disrespect for authority! Like every good action movie, you have an inmate threatening then attempting to rape a female guard, several people are shot to death, an arm is severed from a body, and a body is thrown from a plane. Pretty standard stuff. Crude terms for a woman's vagina were used to belittle men, classic.

I did appreciate Nic's over-protection of the stuffed bunny in the film. In my mind, the bunny represented my teenage innocence: sometimes it was taken out of the box, and maybe it got a little sewer water on it, but Cage was there to clean it off and protect its existence at all cost. In general, the theme of the film is the lament of lost youth; and the understanding that you can stand by in regret or take action now and keep whatever honor and youth you have left. The end is an ad for Las Vegas, a city known for regret. I just wish that Nicolas took his shirt off.

Movie quotability:

• "I like my black cherry jello"
• "I said.  Put the bunny. Back in the box."
• "Why couldn't you put the bunny back in the box?"
• "Hoo-ray for the sounds of fucking silence."
• "What'd you think I'm gonna do?  I'm gonna save the fuckin' day."
• "It's not exactly Mai Tais and Yahtzee out here.  Let's do it!"

Plot Holes:

• US Marshal Vince Larkin is able to drive away in the totally badass Corvette that isn't his, just because he feels like it.
• SPOILER:  Strange rock crusher is hanging out on Freemont St. seemingly just to crush Malkovitch's head.

	CAGEamatic	Cinematic
Skyler	Acceptable	Acceptable
Shauna
James	2.89/5	2.89/5
Martine	!Stayed in the Cage!