#49 Christmas Carol: The Movie

#49 Christmas Carol: The Movie

Year: 2001

Director: Jimmy T. Murakami
MPAA Rating: PG

Epic Co-stars: Kate Winslet

Running Time: 77 mins
Cage Time: 4%
Cage Kills: 0
Cage Flip-outs: 0

Skyler's Review: 

Someone spent $10 million on this animated movie. It must be some sort of money laundering thing because it is terrible. The movie starts off and you think to yourself, "This is one of those animated movies from the 80s". The animation is surely pre-Beauty and the Beast. I mean, look at it. The frame rate is low, the animation is drawn, not rendered.

This is one frame of Nicolas Cage as a ghost. You've almost seen the whole scene now.

Then you look to see the year that this movie came out and see "2001". What! Then you start to think, "Was animation still that bad in 2001?" No. Other movies that came out that year: Shrek, Monsters Inc., Harry Potter 1, and Lord of the Rings 1.

Why was this movie made? It's not as good as Muppet Christmas Carol, to be sure. Did this movie come before the Muppets? No, the Muppets actually preceded this disaster by 9 years.

The movie isn't even a "as true to the story as possible" thing. There are mice EVERYWHERE. Are they all going to die of the plague? I don't remember this in the book. In fact, the story is barely recognizable at all. Except for that guy named "Scrooge" and the title of the movie.

Nicolas Cage is excellent as always.

Movie quotability:

• "Ooooohhhhh [loud chain sounds]."

Plot Holes:

• The fact that this movie was even made.  Do we really need yet another animated rendition of this movie?  Never mind one that is presented in such a lame, cliched style?

	CAGEamatic	Cinematic
Skyler	Dreadful	Troll
Shauna
James	0.15/5	0.04/5
Martine	!Bonded with Shauna in the Cage!

#42 Captain Corelli's Mandolin

#42 Captain Corelli's Mandolin

Year: 2001

Director: John Madden
MPAA Rating: R

Epic Co-stars: Penelope Cruz, Christian Bale, Olivander

Running Time: 131 mins
Cage Time: 90%
Cage Kills: 0
Cage Flip-outs: 1

James' Review:  I must admit that my expectations were pretty low going into this one which is the prefect place to be just before being MILDLY ENTERTAINED!  Reviews from friends told me this was going to be a slow going chick flick with plenty of overacted emotional trash, but what I actually got was a medium moving chick flick with a shamanic Cage totally nailing his role as an eccentric Italian falling in love with a pretty hot chick.

Dr. Cage plays Captain Antonio Corelli; a WWII era Italian Captain stationed on a small Greek island.  Luckily for Captain C and his buddies, the Italian forces in Greece aren't playing too big of a roll in Hitler's master plan.  This leaves plenty of time for them to drink, sing, almost blow themselves up, and most important of all: try to bang the locals.  All this is very easy to do with only a single German soldier on the island who is too overwhelmed with lazy Italians to have any authority.  It isn't until the German army comes back to town and messes with the Captain's hot new love toy that he finally straightens up and grows a pair to defend the ones he loves.

As with Next, I'm pretty sure the whole purpose of this movie was to allow Cage to make out the a beautiful woman who is not his wife.  Success!

Although the flip-out count is painfully low in Captain Corelli's Mandolin there are a few bright moments that can keep even an action loving Cage fan mildly interested.  First off, even though Cage isn't explosive, he still entertains with a mediocre italian accent and some ridiculous eccentricities like counting off forty-five bars of silence before playing a solo on his mandolin.  His character oozes with such confidence that almost everything he does is entertaining because it's delivered in a slightly restrained yet classic Nouveau Shamanic style.  Second, Christian Bale fans will enjoying seeing him in a slightly different role than usual.  The best way to describe him would be "douche bag", yet I think most of the ladies will agree that he still looks pretty hot.  And finally, there are at least a half a dozen sets of boobs.  Most of these are from random Greek women which are great, but the attentive viewer will be rewarded with full dual nippage from the beautiful Penelope Cruz.  

The unfortunate reality of this film.

Although Captain Corelli's Mandolin doesn't pack the usual Cage punch with crazy flip-outs,  high flying explosions, and memorable lines, it does provide a unique role for Dr. Cage to impress us with once again.  A short hair cut allows him to portray a mildly attractive man while his er of confidence allows him to charm the audience almost as much as he does Ms. Cruz.  The main problem here was the length of the film.  Had it been cut about 30 minutes shorter and not such a test on my attention span, my tits would have been out there for Cage right next to Penelope's.

Movie quotability: total crap

• "This is terrible. I was so happy five minutes ago, looking at his butt... and now he's crying." -Shauna (of Christian Bale)
• "That is a purely psychological effect." -Penelope's dad, of a 'miracle' healing
• "I long to feel something... even if it is only pain." -Penelope; "Oh, you're going to be feeling something." -James; "A shot of Vitamin C, heh heh." -Skyler
• "Bella bambina at two o'clock!"
• "Fuck off. If you don't know what 'fuck off' means, you're welcome to come in and we'll show you. We refuse to surrender to a nation that we have defeated in Albania, and we reserve the right to surrender to a German officer of significant rank. So fuck off."
• "He even sings Shamanic." -Skyler
• "Loves enters by the eyes and also lives by the eyes, take it from me."
• "When you fall in love, it is a temporary madness. It erupts like an earthquake, and then it subsides. And when it subsides, you have to make a decision. You have to work out whether your roots are become so entwined together that it is inconceivable that you should ever part. Because this is what love is. Love is not breathlessness, it is not excitement, it is not the desire to mate every second of the day. It is not lying awake at night imagining that he is kissing every part of your body. No... don't blush. I am telling you some truths. For that is just being in love; which any of us can convince ourselves we are. Love itself is what is left over, when being in love has burned away. Doesn't sound very exciting, does it? But it is! "
• "This makes me realize I should write a note to Nic Cage before something like this happens to ME. That's the whole point of this movie." -James

Plot Holes:

• None, a flawless script.

	CAGEamatic	Cinamatic
Skyler	Acceptable	Acceptable
Shauna
James	2.19/5.00	2.74/5.00
Martine	! Stayed in the Cage !