From Oscar-winner to Internet legend, few actors have as wide and varied a career as Nicolas Cage. His apparent willingness to take on any role, no matter how dreadful, has been parodied time and again:
But for people like me who love bad films, Nicolas Cage’s filmography is a treasure trove of over-acting, plot holes, embarrassing dialogue and baffling twists. Here are some of his most accidentally hilarious films.
Vampire’s Kiss (1988)
Peter Loew thinks that he’s turning into a vampire, while having to contend with misfiled reports at work and also torturing his cleaner. This is a really strange film which surprisingly shares a lot of DNA with American Psycho (yuppie believes he is going insane and murdering people) but it’s nowhere near as well executed. It does however provide many hilarious moments of Cage freaking out, with the scene above being the pick of the bunch.
Face/Off (1997)
I am not in any way suggesting that Face/Off is a serious film. It is however one of those huge 90s action thrillers where the focus is on the explosions, and it’s not meant to be quite a comedy. Cage is on top form here as a ruthless killer being chased by John Travolta, and they end up having to swap faces for reasons and of course it all goes to shit pretty quickly. The real joy in the film is watching Travolta play Cage play Travolta, and Cage play Travolta play Cage (confused yet?)
National Treasure (2004)
One of Cage’s more family-friendly offerings, this one is very dear to my heart simply because of the way he says “I’m going to steal the Declaration of Independence” without a hint of irony. That’s essentially the plot too: Nicolas Cage and his friends try and steal the Declaration of Independence because they didn’t get to work on the film of The Da Vinci Code.
The Wicker Man (2006)
In this ill-advised remake of the 1973 British horror of the same name, Nicolas Cage is Edward Malus, called out to the island of Summersisle to investigate the disappearance of his ex’s daughter. Please do not go to watch this expecting a horror or a thriller or any sort of resemblance to the original. This is without a doubt one of the worst films ever made, but if you go into it forewarned and expecting a comedy you will not be disappointed. I can watch this film over and over again; it’s got so many traits of a classic bad Cage film: freaking out, missing daughters, he even goes on fire at one point. Please do yourself a favour and watch this with a few of your mates and some beers (maybe even giving the drinking game a go: http://screenrobot.com/five-great-film-based-drinking-games/4/); you’ll have the time of your life!
Emma Donovan