The Five Types Of Nicolas Cage Movies

Quick, name the protagonist of “National Treasure.” Prior to watching 73 Cage movies, I couldn’t. Most other big name stars are defined by at least one role — Wolverine, Hermione, Indiana Jones, Katniss Everdeen — and their challenge is to build a career outside of that role. Cage has no such defining franchise and no such defining role; his challenge is to make a role unique — and to build a career outside of being Nicolas Cage.

Not The Bees!

“There are some things that you see, and you can’t unsee them. Know what I mean?”

— Max California (Joaquin Phoenix) to Tom Welles (Nicolas Cage) in “8MM”

Films: “Fire Birds” (1990), “Amos & Andrew” (1993), “Trapped in Paradise” (1994), “Snake Eyes” (1998), “8MM” (1999), “Captain Corelli’s Mandolin” (2001), “Windtalkers” (2002), “The Wicker Man” (2006), “Next” (2007), “Bangkok Dangerous” (2008), “Knowing” (2009), “Astro Boy” (2009), “The Sorcerer’s Apprentice” (2010), “Season of the Witch” (2011), “Drive Angry” (2011), “Ghost Rider: Spirit of Vengeance” (2012), “Left Behind” (2014)

Now we come to the heart of it: Cage has been in many, many enormously bad movies. All of the films in this category were rated 50 percent or less on Rotten Tomatoes and made less than $120 million in 2018 dollars.

Remember, Cage is making a lot of bets — so he’s had plenty of opportunities to roll snake eyes. Still, I think that Cage’s work gets the short end of the stick on aggregated rating sites. Many, though not all, of these films aren’t really as bad as Rotten Tomatoes makes them out to be. It would be hard to prove this, but perhaps Cage’s work is uniquely prone to the trap of online averages. Rating sites algorithmically make polarizing films — ones that make strong if controversial choices — look like mediocre or bad films.

And then there’s the added problem that Cage is somewhat defined by these choices. In a movie like “The Wicker Man,” for example, it’s easy to separate out a particularly hammy scene and make Cage look like a hack. Here, let me do exactly that:

But the take that Cage is a bad actor is a lazy one. It fails to account for why Cage’s choices stand out. When there’s a dissonance between his interpretation of the material and the directorial choices, you get scenes like the bees. Think about it: He’s giving a pretty true read of how a California Highway Patrol officer would react to being tortured with bees by a pagan cult prior to being sacrificed. If it looks ridiculous, that’s equally on the other choices being made at the directorial level that don’t set Cage’s dedication up for success. He’s the guy at the karaoke bar who is going absolutely all in on a Meatloaf song, but the music is an off-tempo midi file.

In roles like this, I’ve come to think of Cage as a golfer who has one of the best drives in the game but is inevitably judged by his performances on miniature golf courses. When you act a lot and make big choices, sometimes they don’t work.

Recession

“How deep is hell?”

— Paul McGuire (Nicolas Cage) in “Rage”

Films: “Trespass” (2011), “Stolen” (2012), “Seeking Justice” (2012), “Dying of the Light” (2014), “Rage” (2014), “Outcast” (2015), “Pay the Ghost” (2015), “The Runner” (2015), “Army of One” (2016), “Dog Eat Dog” (2016), “USS Indianapolis: Men of Courage” (2016), “Arsenal” (2017), “Inconceivable” (2017), “Looking Glass” (2018)

Let’s talk about Cage’s recent work. The man has been making four movies a year every year since 2011. He’s the only person in Hollywood who makes Dwayne Johnson look lazy. Regrettably, most of them have sucked. All of these movies made essentially zero dollars at the box office. They’re video-on-demand movies, or they were targeted at the international market.

An uncharitable analysis of Cage’s situation looks at the fact that he invested a high percentage of his assets into real estate immediately prior to the housing crisis and since then has had to unwind a number of investment properties at a loss in order to make good on some outstanding obligations. So, he’s been making any movie where the check doesn’t bounce in order to get back on an even financial keel. This is the narrative pushed by people attempting to dunk on Nic Cage.

A far more charitable read is that Cage really does like to work, and he is getting older, so the slam-dunk leading man roles aren’t as common as they used to be. What’s more, his pivot to video-on-demand actually came ahead of the broader, Netflix-fueled industry shift that values unconventional release patterns and streaming distribution.

As with most complicated things, the truth is likely somewhere in the middle.

In the grand realm of direct-to-consumer films, Cage’s movies are far more interesting than much of what else is out there. His ultimate skill as an actor is that he is supremely watchable. When a movie is not good, at the very least he’s compelling. For a master class in this, check out “The Runner,” with Cage as a Louisiana politician who’s having a post-Deepwater Horizon personal collapse, or “Rage,” which is a captivating spin on revenge movies like “Taken.”

Nouveau-Shamanic

“Why you wanna sell your life short? Playing it safe is just about the most dangerous thing a woman like you could do.”

— Ronny Cammareri (Nicolas Cage) in “Moonstruck”

Films: “Fast Times at Ridgemont High” (1982), “Valley Girl” (1983), “Birdy” (1984), “Peggy Sue Got Married” (1986), “Raising Arizona” (1987), “Moonstruck” (1987), “Red Rock West” (1994), “Leaving Las Vegas” (1995), “Face/Off” (1997), “Adaptation” (2002), “Matchstick Men” (2003), “Bad Lieutenant: Port of Call New Orleans” (2009), “Joe” (2014)

It’s here where I remind you that Cage has won an Oscar, and his core advantage and core flaw are the same thing: He is far less risk-averse than the rest of Hollywood. He’s a guy whom David Lynch called the “jazz musician of acting” and whom Ethan Hawke described as “the only actor since Marlon Brando that’s actually done anything new with the art of acting.” These movies are him at his peak — all are rated roughly 80 percent or higher on Rotten Tomatoes.

In “Face/Off,” he plays a terrorist, and then an FBI agent who takes that terrorist’s face, and then the FBI agent who is pretending to be that terrorist. He can be hammy, but that takes a superb degree of restraint and craft. In “Adaptation,” he plays a pair of identical twins who act off each other and have distinctly different personalities. That got him an Oscar nomination. And, of course, in “Leaving Las Vegas,” he plays a broken man experiencing the entire spectrum of professional and personal collapse, from flame out to cirrhotic suicide.

Describing his own style, Cage calls it “nouveau-shamanic.” It’s unique. Take it away, Nic:

I think we all agree that that’s pretty weird, but if pursuing a trance-like state to get into character is what works, then freaking do it, Nic. His range alone bears out the success of his methods.

Cage has more in common with Meryl Streep — who also has a flair for accents, an Oscar pedigree and her share of bold misses — than he does with other leading men, many of whom settle into a type. Looking at the list of box office stars who have made the most money from movies based on an original screenplay — the people who make a living outside of adapted franchises — Cage comes in ninth, with $1.7 billion derived from 45 original screenplay films. Set aside the “Star Wars” trio and he’s sixth, behind only Adam Sandler, Tom Hanks, Ben Stiller, Will Ferrell and Robert De Niro.

All of those guys have a type: Adam Sandler the manchild, Tom Hanks the decent fella, Ben Stiller the affable straight man, Will Ferrell the screamer and Robert De Niro the tough guy.