#62 The Cotton Club

#62 The Cotton Club

Year: 1984

Director: Francis Ford Coppola
MPAA Rating: R

Epic Co-stars: Richard Gere, Gregory Hines, Diane Lane, Morpheus

Running Time: 127 mins 
Cage Time: 5%
Cage Kills: bunches
Cage Flip-outs: 1

Skyler's Review: 

Nic Cage plays Richard Gere's brother- you can tell they're brothers, because they have identical pencil-thin mustaches (much admired by James and Skyler). Cage is married to Baby from Dirty Dancing---three years before Dirty Dancing, certainly before the nose job that probably cost her career.

Richard Gere plays a jazz musician, Dixie Dwyer, who happens to save a gangster's life during a police raid on a bootleg jazz bar. Or something. The gangster, "Dutch," takes a liking to Dwyer and hires him as a musician/personal assistant, and Dwyer's kid brother, Vincent (Nic Cage) as hired muscle. Dutch is a real creeper--played by James Remar--who does things like cheerfully stab gangsters in the throat over Jewish slurs.

Nicolas Cage with a sweet mustache. I just wish he got more screen time in this movie.

Young Diane Lane looks exactly like Julia Stiles and is the love interest for Gere. White people are gangsters, bootleggers, etc. Black people are very musical.

Most of Nic Cage's quotes are heavy on the "N-word" so you won't see many below. Turns out his character isn't crazy about Black people, and his job primarily seems to consist of shooting or punching them and stealing their money.

Movie quotability:

• "This is the handsomest I've ever seen Richard Gere." -James
• "You white folks are so smart." -Sandman
• "Bugle Boy, me Jesse James!" -Nic Cage
• "You know how I got that big? I ate a pigeon every day." -Dutch
• "You do move me... in unusual places." -Dixie

Plot Holes:

• Richard Gere and Diane Lane slap each other in the face and start fight-dancing, and people at the club applaud. 

	CAGEamatic	Cinematic
Skyler	Acceptable	Poor
Shauna
James	2.17/5.00	2.81/5.00
Martine	!Read in the CAGE!

#58 Birdy

#58 Birdy

Year: 1984

Director: Alan Parker

MPAA Rating: R

Epic Co-stars: Matthew Modine

Running Time: 120 mins
Cage Time: 85%
Cage Kills: 0 
Cage Flip-outs: 5

James' Stream of Conscience:
Al Columbato (NIc Cage) just got out of a military hospital and has bandages all over his face.  While on the train he drifts off while muttering something about "Birdy" and what he put him through when they were kids.  Cage was a popular kid who befriends "Birdy", a outcast who captures and trains pigeons.  Together they build a pigeon coup and use special home-made bird costumes to capture birds from a mill at night. Birdy takes a huge fall and doesn't seem to care.  He's just happy that he got to fly.

In present day, Cage arrives in a military mental hospital.  Birdy is locked up in a cell and doesn't communicate with anyone.  He is crouched in the corner and appears to have severe mental damage.  Cage is there to help the doctors figure out what the hell is wrong with Birdy.  Queue dramatic Cage-Birdy 1 on 1 in a prison cell. 

Nic Cage is virtually the only person on earth that can make love to another man in a bird costume and still look totally awesome doing it.

1st attempt:  Cage tries to talk about old times and remember the good ones.  No dice, Birdy won't say a word to him and doesn't even really look at him.
2nd attempt:  Cage is frustrated, even slightly angry with Birdy.  Still nothing.
3rd attempt:  Cage gets real.  He talks life and philosophy but Birdy remains in the same twisted squatting pose that he's always been in.
4th attempt:  Cage feeds Birdy.  Birdy eats.  Birdy makes eye contact.
5th attempt:  Cage Jokes...  BIRDY SMILES!
6th attempt:  Sponge bath with the nurse.  Cage makes a good move by just observing
7th attempt:  Pure Cage rage all directed towards Birdy.  Birdy cries.  Cage leaves.  Cage cries.  
8th attempt:  Baseballs...

A face that only a mother could love.  ...and a father.   ...and every other person on the face of the earth.

Back in the day, more memories flow by.  They steal a car and drive to the beach.  Cage nails a chick while Birdy creeps out her friend and drives them away.  Cage looks pissed; blue balls for sure.  Birdy can't stop thinking about birds, not chicks, birds.  He stays up all night playing with birds, creates amazing Di Vinci style flying machines, gives school reports on feathers, and even homemade human sized wings that may just allow him to finally bridge the human-avian divide.  

Bottom line:  This movie isn't bad.  If you want to see something a bit out of the ordinary with plenty of young Charming Cage, Birdy is the film for you.  And even if you find that it isn't the film for you stick around for the ending.  The final 2 minutes are probably the best 2 minutes in the entire film.  

Movie quotability:

• (whispers) "Sure you feel like it."
• "I want to go back and change, I look stupid."  "Not to a bird Al."
• "You're wrong! They're dead: plucked and fucked!"
• "Whoa, his foot looks like a weird giant dong." - James
• "Mammary glands?  MAMMARY GLANDS?!?  No, we're talking tits here! Big tits...  Round tits...  Fleshy tits...  Full tits..."
• "This fucking fucker's fucked" (Cage's Dad when trying to start the car, but used again by Cage 9 years later in Deadfall)
• "This guy's really into birds." - Skyler

Plot Holes:

• Anytime anything exciting happens La Bamba plays.

	CAGEamatic	Cinamatic
Skyler	Exceeds Expectations	Exceeds Expectations
Shauna
James	3.81/5	3.22/5
Martine	!Huffed her blankey while being fixated on the Cage!

#37 Racing with the Moon

#37 Racing with the Moon

Year: 1984

Director: Richard Benjamin
MPAA Rating: PG

Epic Co-stars: Sean Penn, Elizabeth McGovern

Running Time: 108 min
Cage Time: 20%
Cage Kills: 0
Cage Flip-outs: 1

Skyler's Review: 

In short, this film is about some kids (Cage and Penn) whose numbers have come up for the draft of WW2 (for those of you that don't remember a time before Twitter, that is World War Two, the one against the Nazis). Since they know they are off to war after the summer, they spend their time in a sort of limbo. They make impulsive decisions and dangerous ones.

If you cut out all of the scenes with Sean Penn, the movie would have been much shorter; almost watchable.

Cage's character keeps on telling Penn's character to find some girls to just have some fun with since they are about to bug out. Penn's character then falls in love; oops. Generally, Nic Cage is awesome, as always; Sean Penn is the worst since as I was watching all I could think about is all the terrible things Penn said about the Master of the Screen. (If you don't know what I am referring to, see our previous review for #36 Fast Times).

These two are racing a train. They never race the moon. Awful.

This is now two films in a row that have more Sean Penn than Nic Cage on the screen. Two films in a row that has characters getting abortions. Two films in a row that made me wish I was watching something else. Except for when Dr. Cage was delivering his part, of course.

Movie quotability:

• "This movie makes no goddamn sense."-James
• "Is this a slasher?"-Skyler
• "I like how all graveyards have smoke blowing through them, regardless of the time of day."-James
• "I bet she looks like a rose and smells as sweet." -Sean Penn's dad, creepily
• "Oh, Mrs. Spangler- religion's a little shaky."-Caddie
• "I ain't gonna be no sap to some skirt."- NC
• "Come back nurse. I wanna show you my "wound"" -Cage

Plot Holes:

• Sean Penn is terrible.

	CAGEamatic	Cinamatic
Skyler	Acceptable	Dreadful
Shauna
James	2.25/5	2.25/5
Martine	!Wasted two hours in the CAGE!