Around a decade ago, just after a celebrated turn in “Kick Ass,” Nicolas Cage started what would come to be known as his era of direct-to-video movies.
After being a fixture on the big screen for many years, the actor hit a series of perceived duds both large (“The Sorcerer’s Apprentice,” “Ghost Rider: Spirit of Vengeance,” “Astro Boy”) and medium-small (“Trespass,” “Seeking Justice,” “Bangkok Dangerous,” “Drive Angry”).
Then he mostly seemed to spend several years churning out a series of direct-to-video titles from “211” and “Looking Glass,” to “Arsenal” and “Primal,” that most aren’t really aware of. Aside from the occasional bit of voice acting, he mostly stayed away from major studio filmmaking.
Yet even in this period he occasionally struck gold with acclaimed turns in movies like “Joe,” “Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse,” and of course “Mandy” which heralded something of a new Cage-naissance and has yielded some promising movies since from the bonkers “Willy’s Wonderland” and “Prisoners of the Ghostland,” to his celebrated role in “Pig” which made many best of year lists.
With the release of “The Unbearable Weight of Massive Talent” in cinemas, everyone is celebrating all things Cage right now and the actor recently spoke with Rolling Stone about his ‘direct-to-video’ period. Despite what people may think, Cage says he was never less than 100% committed to his roles and anyone who thought he was apathetic about his choices is dead wrong:
“People thought I didn’t care. I did. I was caring. I think that I did some of the best work of my life in that so-called ‘direct to video’ period. ‘Massive Talent’ was in that group. ‘Mandy’ was in that group. ‘Pig,’ ‘Bad Lieutenant: Port of New Orleans,’ ‘Joe,’ ‘Mom and Dad,’ ‘Color Out of Space’ – they were all in that group.
‘The Runner’ I thought was terrific. I’ll put any of those movies up [against] the first 30 years. If there is a misconception, it’s perhaps overlooking that there was a genuine commitment to performance.
To answer your question, I think that [people thinking I didn’t care] would be a misconception in my view. But then again, all art is subjective. People are open to their opinions and their interpretations. Whatever they want to take from it, they’re not wrong.”
Cage went on to praise working in those direct-to-video movies as it helped him hone his skills:
“The best workshop, the best acting class I could have. I think it really was practice. I felt it made it so much easier for me to access my emotional content or my imagination. It was at my fingertips because of the training and the constant work.
Part of the perception of the drop in quality was that Cage was said to have owed millions in taxes and he admitted to GQ last month he did take on so many VOD movies in order to get out of debt. However, he maintains he cared about every role and he was able to pay off all his debts nearly two years ago now.
“The Unbearable Weight of Massive Talent” opens in cinemas on April 22nd.
Source: Rolling Stone
