Review of "The Unbearable Weight of Massive Talent" an action film starring Nicolas Cage
Unfortunate speculation on the popularity of the main actor-meme of the twenty-first century.
Nicolas Cage (Nicolas Cage) is going through a tough time. The director of "Joe" and the "Halloween" reboot, David Gordon Green (David Gordon Green), does not take the actor on a promising project, and his family turns their back on the star because of his intolerable narcissism. To close a large money debt, Cage makes a deal with his conscience. For a million dollars, he agrees to be the guest of honor at the birthday party of the rich man Javi Gutiérrez (Pedro Pascal). Already in Mallorca, the hero discovers that the birthday boy is not only his biggest fan, but also a drug lord. At the request of the CIA Nicholas is trying to expose the criminal. And along the way he has a blast on the luxury coast.
On paper, "The Unbearable Gravity of Great Talent" sounded like a potential cult hit of the decade. Nicolas Cage, in the Nicolas Cage movie, exposes the head of a cartel, and in between spy assignments watches The Adventures of Paddington 2, tries drugs and argues with an imaginary version of himself from the past--the successful and boorish Nicky. The exhausted viewer, entangled in layers of post-irony, is left to meekly watch the charming circus, this time literally on wheels.
But the prank is out of control. Either director and screenwriter Tom Gormican (author of the mediocre melodrama This Awkward Moment) has completely misunderstood the Nicolas Cage phenomenon, or the banal postmodern flirtations no longer make the same impression. Every joke here is fake, every reference is exaggerated beyond belief. In the dialogues, Gormican and co-writer Kevin Etten recall Cage's most popular films: "Air Prison" and "Without a Face." And the most controversial and, consequently, memetic ones seem to be put out of brackets: neither the bear costume from "The Wicker Man" nor the embarrassing scenes from the "Ghost Rider" dilogy will be remembered here. It is as if the movie disowns the real Nicholas.
At the announcement stage, The Conjuring was often compared to Adaptation, a tragicomedy in which Cage plays real-life screenwriter and director Charlie Kaufman. For cinematographer Kaufman, the movie became a confession, a tangled story about the florid mindset of an artist and underlying complexes. "The Unbearable Burden of Great Talent" doesn't even pretend to be that candid: the melodramatic family conflict between the actor and his loved ones comes to the fore. While the real Cage marries and divorces in a week, pulls drunken pranks and makes lousy movies, the on-screen one is just trying to mend his relationship with his family.
The problem is not that without exaggeration brilliant creator Nicolas Cage has been simplified to the image of a gore parent. Even superficially, The Conjuring resembles a Disney+ family action movie rather than a madcap action film. Except that in place of a guest star like Chris Pratt or Robert Downey Jr. is a missing and forgotten meme artist. There's no blinding neon and no bloody murders, which is what we loved about the later Nicholas films. Gormican's chambery and understated television directing doesn't allow for such luxuries. If this is a movie for Cage fans, it's for those who stopped following the star's career after the '90s.
Here's the paradox: A movie about an immense personality lacks scale, scope and ingenuity. Imagine if a biopic about the legendary punk coprophile G.G. Allin suddenly turned into a nice comedy for the evening about how bad it is to be selfish. It's moments like this that make you desperately wish the only narcissist on the set had never been allowed to participate in the writing of the script.
This article was sponsored by Tristy Patterson
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