After forty years in show business, what else is there left for Nicolas Cage to do? At his best — for thirty years, in fact — the actor nimbly toed the line between blockbuster action hero and fully committed dramatic performer. Often aware of his onscreen habits and lampooned for his onscreen vocal and physical excesses, Cage intermittently played those expectations for greater dramatic tension and pure comedy. During the 2010s, when he appeared to take any role thrown his way — roles many interpreted as being beneath his talents — it was difficult to envision a scenario when he could come back (not that he ever left).
But after the unhinged “Mandy,” the aesthetically sumptuous “Spider-Man: Into the Spider-verse,” and the aching tragedy of “Pig,” Cage appears to be back (not that he ever left). It’s fitting, therefore, to now see Cage in Tom Gormican’s nostalgic adventure trip “The Unbearable Weight of Massive Talent,” a true love letter to every facet of Cage’s past and a tantalizing roadmap to his future.
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Oscillating between a meta-led stroll down memory lane and a deeply affecting bromance, Cage’s towering playing of, well, himself, is captivating and hypnotic. For those who didn’t grow up with Cage or have a chance to engage with his work beyond memes and gifs, it’s difficult to wholly put into context how his uniquely neurotic screen presence made him cinema’s most unlikely action star and its mostest dramatic actor. You have to show them “Moonstruck,” “Peggy Sue Got Married,” “The Rock,” or “Gone in 60 Seconds” to really understand. Gormican assumes you’ve seen Cage’s biggest successes and even his little-known cult classics. And if you haven’t, then you’ll soon adore them as much as he clearly does.
Overly leveraging the idea of Nicolas Cage could’ve easily encased “The Unbearable Weight of Massive Talent” in a series of tasteless funhouse mirrors, or worse, punched down on his career. Instead, the first quarter of Gormican’s film sees Cage wrestling with the idea of Cage and how that image affects those around him. His ex-wife Olivia (Sharon Horgan), a former makeup artist, is fed up with his self-involved antics. His teenage daughter Addy (Lily Sheen) is over his old movie tastes and trying to fit into his mold. More than anything, Cage wants a comeback, a juicy role to resolidify his title as a movie star. In fact, a hilarious scene at the Chateau Marmont sees him meeting with a producer for such a role whereby he teeters between conceited and desperate as he immediately dons a Bostonian accent to perform an intense monologue with valet parking as the backdrop.
It’s further revealed that Cage is in massive debt. He owes $600K to the Sunset Tower hotel. Between his divorce and extravagant spending habits, he needs money and fast. Thankfully, his agent (Neil Patrick Harris) tells him of an odd request: a wealthy olive oil baron, Javi Gutierrez (Pedro Pascal), is a big fan. A superfan, in fact, and he wants the actor to star in a script he’s written by ostensibly inviting Cage to his Mallorca retreat for a birthday party. In return, he will pay the action hero a million dollar appearance fee. Cage thinks of the opportunity as beneath him, but beggars can’t be choosers, and what’s the worst that can go wrong on a sunny paradise island ripped from a James Bond movie? Plenty, apparently.
Gormican and Kevin Etten’s self-aware script catapults us into Cage’s career by weaving in classic clips from movies. In the film’s opening, a young couple sits on a couch, mouthing the words to “Con Air,” until masked men with guns burst through the door to take the girl. Conversely, Cage arrives at Javy’s estate hoping to pass the time and collect the dough quickly — but he discovers a kindred spirit in the earnest millionaire. Both men love “The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari,” they cry while watching “Paddington 2,” and they ache for smart, adult-centered, character-driven cinema. It seems unthinkable, then, when CIA agents Vivien (Tiffany Haddish) and Ray (Ike Barinholtz) inform Cage that Javi is the head of an international gun cartel and kidnapped the aforementioned presidential candidate’s daughter, holding her prisoner somewhere on the compound. Could Javi, a man so gleeful and so boyish, be so cruel? To get closer to Javi, Cage agrees to make his movie; the pair dissect the ills of the current comic book-heavy, Blockbuster bankrupt Hollywood landscape.
Searching through Cage’s past, “The Unbearable Weight of Massive Talent” discovers original paths to form needed critiques. Whenever Cage appears sincere, a vain and deranged version of him as Nicky — think of his real-life 1992 entrance on Wogan wherein he brandished long hair, a leather jacket, and threw money into the crowd — appears to tell him differently. The mo-cap technology falls short, rendering Cage grotesquely plastic. But considering Nicky is totemic of a grotesque Hollywood wherein ego rules the day, the jarring aesthetic carries real symbolic heft. As Cage and Javi plan their movie, Vivien makes suggestions for the script to mine for clues. Her proposals make it more universal and sellable, mirroring how soul-sucking Hollywood marketing can lead to morally bankrupt pictures and reminding Cage of why feeding into the machine can’t wholly satiate his artistic hunger.
Similar to “The Matrix: Resurrections,” Gormican crafts listless action sequences and anti-climactic car chases as commentaries of the current visually inert Blockbuster moviemaking. He similarly wields Javi’s cousin (Paco León) to predictable ends. Therefore when “The Unbearable Weight of Massive Talent” knowingly contorts from a series of hilarious odes to Cage’s career to commonplace action movie maneuvers, the initially clipped pacing by editor Melissa Bretherton can stumble and sputter to a crawl. The father-daughter relationship felt by Cage and Addy isn’t overly robust either, nor the relationship with his ex-wife. It’s all a tad too reedy, too reliant on Cage’s personality to carry the day.
For all the overt commentary on Hollywood and meta-absurdity, “The Unbearable Weight of Massive Talent” wouldn’t at all work without the unflinching chemistry shared by Cage and Pascal. Whether it’s cruising around Mallorca on acid or jumping off cliffs together, they share a genuine love affair for each other and movies. With rapid-fire precision, Cage alters through different shades of his star persona, jumping between the crazed heights of “Wicker Man” and the quiet solemnity of “Pig.” We’re never quite sure how much of the actual Cage exists in these turns. We only know that, for Javi, this is the authentic Cage. And that’s enough.
Pascal turns in the best performance of his career as the charmed fanboy and full-throated friend. His emotions are so close to the surface they’d catch fire if lit. And when Cage first appears on the island, the unvarnished joy displayed by Pascal of a man meeting his idol mirrors all of us. Like him, we get to witness Cage’s greatest hits: the unlikely action hero, the romantic comedian, the pastiche personality, and the introspective thespian — in one movie. We’re treated to the throwback of throwback performances. Because in Gormican’s uproarious “The Unbearable Weight of Massive Talent,” Cage delivers a crowd-pleasing triumph that reminds audiences that he’s always been — no matter the part, no matter the reviews — a star who makes the movies infinitely better just by being him. [B+]
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