The Unbearable Weight of Massive Talent

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I love a movie like this because, in recommending it, the target audience is easy to figure out; fans of the featured actor. While my personal favourite is still probably 'My Name is Bruce' (featuring Bruce Campbell as himself), I have to say that this is a very close second. This one is for any one of us who has thrived on Nicolas Cage's extreme over-acting abilities over the years. It may not quite be Cage at his "Cage-iest", but it definitely satisfies the Cage-craving one will be looking for.

Nicolas Cage (as himself) is living a close-to-has-been life in Hollywood, being passed over for several roles, and constantly arguing with his alter-ego "Nicky" (who is the version of Cage we really wanna see). Nicky is essentially the younger side of him that gave him success, and torments him about being washed up. If that's not enough, his family life is also suffering due to years of emotional neglect, being constantly away from his now ex-wife Olivia (Sharon Horgan) and, more importantly, daughter Addy (Lily Mo Sheen). This all leads to Cage planning on retirement, once and for all, in order to get his life together.

Cage's agent, Richard Fink (Neil Patrick Harris) offers him a deal of $1 million to head to Majorca in the Balearic Islands near Spain to be the guest of honour a billionaire Javi Gutierrez's (Pedro Pascal) birthday. The two eventually bond, especially over a shared love of movies, but soon Cage learns that he may be in over his head when CIA agents Vivian (Tiffany Haddish) and Martin (Ike Barinholtz) enter the scene, claiming that Javi is a wanted arms dealer, and responsible for the kidnapping of an anti-crime politician's daughter, Maria (Katrin Vankova).

Reluctantly, Cage decides to help the CIA despite his newfound friendship. In the meantime, however, he can't help but take Javi's ideas for a collaborative movie script into consideration. So it ends up being a bit of a rock-and-a-hard-place situation for Mr. Cage. As one would expect, it delivers just fine on Nick Cage being the Nick Cage we've come to love, and it's really cool to see him able to make fun of himself in various aspects of his life - like the idea of him being a film buff trying to share obscure movies like 'The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari' with his teenage daughter. It's a fantastic feat of cinematic production for its time, but it's very clear that not everyone is gonna appreciate something like it these days.

There's really not much more to say about it. I'd break it down simply to recommending it to fans of Nicolas Cage, because that's the clear target audience. The film takes place in a "real-life" scenario, but it doesn't shy away from the over-the-top comedic action that we've come to love Nick Cage for these days. Again, there's plenty of his eccentricity to satisfy the sweet-tooth, and as a loose fan (I don't necessarily like him in everything I've seen him in, but love his extreme acting) I can honestly say that I had a lot of fun with it. I might further highly recommend seeing it with people who will appreciate the "Caginess" of it all.

4/5

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