Entertainment For Lively Minds
Nicolas Cage is selling his castles. Want to buy one?
Nicolas Cage is in the middle of a public falling-out with his former business manager. One of the consequences is that he has to sell some of his properties to pay tax bills. According to the Las Vegas Sun this means he has to thin down a property portfolio which includes the following:
* a mock-Gothic castle in Midford, Somerset. You can view it here if you're interested.
* a townhouse in Bath. It's here. (Bit of a dump but has possibilities.)
* a 28-room castle in Bavaria
* a $12,000,000 residence in Rhode Island
* a $10,000,000 place in Las Vegas
* a little place in Bel Air
* a couple of places in New Orleans which are coming up for auction if you're interested.
Now if Nicolas Cage, who hasn't been in a film we can remember the name of in years, could afford these kind of investments, how much must Tom Cruise be worth?
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The Minus Four Point Seven Man
There are at least a couple of dozen mediocre actors (oops, sorry - "top talent") in the 10-million-plus-a-year bracket, and the less lazy (oops - "more prolific") among them, like Nicolas Cage, make at least two castles-worth of films a year.
But Cage's knack goes beyond snapping up the least understated examples of Europe's architectural heritage. His lasting, almost certainly unrivalled achievement is that he's starred in forty-odd films, only two of which were vaguely any good - Leaving Las Vegas and that ambulance-driver jobbie by Scorsese that everyone forgets all about until they find themselves playing "Name A Decent Nicolas Cage Movie".
But after every seven or eight dismal pups,* just when things are getting so bad you think he's headed for irrevocable Keanuhood, he pulls off an out-of-the-blue box-office hit (Face-Off, Gone in 30 Seconds, the National Treasure franchise...) and his agent ups his fee by another couple of million.
His really is a remarkable career, not least because he's (a) a truly bad actor** - scoring a scandalous -4.7 on the Costner scale - and (b) not found the least bit attractive by any woman I've ever known.*** Like a roomful of chimps with typewriters, he just happens to hit lucky every now and again - and in Hollywood that's all that counts.
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* Titles include Family Man, Matchstick Men, The Weather Man and The Wicker Man. (The Tits Man, Mad Men: The Motion Picture and a cameo as Mr. Hammy in Michael Mann's The Mister Men are currently in production.)
** As Dorothy Parker once put it, he runs the gamut of emotions from A to B. You get rilly chilled dude or rilly pumped dude. That's it. Everything in between - not unlike the exact orbit of an electron - is left to the observer to intuit.
*** Perhaps because, according to a friend, he has "a mouth like a puckering piranha".
Hey, Hey Lay off Kevin
he's been in some excellent films and yes I like Waterworld. And as to NC what about Fast Times at Ridgemont High?
Absolutely
Kevin is just the reset point - zero - on the scale that bears his name. (And I agree: A Perfect World was one of the best films of the Nineties.)
There are lots of actors "to the left of Kevin" - Tom Cruise, for one, scores a straight minus four.
the sad
thing is that while we know or believe he hasn't made anything good for getting on for 20 years, the reality is he has chased the dollar in a bigger way than most other stars including Cruise. He has made one turgid popcorn busting blockbuster after another and I'm sure big fees have been negotiated for him.
After making some interesting work like rumblefish, Peggy Sue got married and up to Leaving Las Vegas he basically reinvented himself into an all action hero and from con air on that's what he's done. From all his films since, you get the feeling that he's asked how much? before even reading the script.
having just looked
at NC's list it is amazing how many bad films he's made presumably they are perfect DVD fodder and so he's weirdly a B-movie A-lister.
The money
Average gross box office of movies starring Nicolas Cage across his career: $48,403,840.
Average gross of his last ten movies: $71,144,764.
Both stats taken from the endlessly fascinating, sortable table at http://www.the-movie-times.com/thrsdir/actors.mv
Nic Cage
I can't deny the guy has zero range but I have enjoyed a couple of his films.How about "Raising Arizona"(halo effect of Coen bros admittedly),or "Red Rocks West"? Thought the latter was a decent little thriller.
Castles in the Air
Old Cagey has moved from "Hard" films like "Leaving Las Vegas" to popcorn. I actually defy any one to get pleasure out of the above film, one to be admired only. Perhaps he felt the same way
you can "enjoy" a "hard" film
have you never come out of dramatic film even one with a "unhappy" ending exhilarated and thrilled you mind swimming with ideas, emotions, images. It's a fortunate nutritional coincidence that popcorn is the perfect metaphor for the sorts of short lived enjoyment you get from blockbusters and I don't dislike blockbusters far from it.
Isn't the accepted method to do two films for the studio and one for yourself?
Nicholas Cage
I appear to be in the minority here, but I enjoy his films. There are some actors I will watch a film for - even trash that barely makes it straight to DVD - and Nick Cage is one of them.
(sticks tongue out and makes raspberry sounds)
I like him, too.
The Rock, Con Air and Face Off are three of my favourite action films, Leaving Las Vegas is easily my favourite drinking film and Raising Arizona one of my favourite comedies. Come on, he owns Raising Arizona; if he'd just made Raising Arizona and died, we'd think he was a comedy genius.
Lately, I thought Ghost Rider and Gone in 30 Seconds were terrible, National Treasure meh and I haven't seen World Trade Center or Knowing, but I enjoyed Lord of War, Matchstick Men and The Weather Man right enough. That's not a bad strike rate.
Archie, you missed hangdog. He does hangdog well.
No, no, not the bees!
He must never be forgiven for the entireless needless Wicker Man reamke.
Isn't hangdog...
just one of the components of rilly chilled dude, like unfazed smirk?
He spends the whole of Weather Man
having milk shake thrown at him, so you might have something there.
Pure hangdog
is, of course, the preserve of the Three-Name Four: Tommy Lee Jones, Billy Bob Thornton, Harry Dean Stanton and Edward James Olmos.
You think I'm just making all this up as I go along, don't you?
Also
I like him in Peggy Sue Got Married. And, for a brief period in my life, Wild At Heart meant a great deal to me. And, if memory serves, wasn't he ok in Birdy?
Wild At Heart
Fantastic. Great jacket. No acting required. Perfect. Must watch again.
Misread this at first
Thought it was about Nick Cave. Was surprised how lucrative goth music could be.
Doesn't Nick Cages
career downward slope mimic to lesser degree Deniro's who didn't put a foot wrong for 10 years, then made some worthy but dull films and then has made almost total dross (or at best ho hum yawn fests) ever since. (Midnight Run being made in 1987 (?)).
Adaptation
Two Nicholas Cage performances for the price of one as he plays identical twins!!
Strange film, but I enjoyed it.