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Nic Cage Getty 1078974542 (1).jpg

'Green Book' Scribe Lands Nic Cage For New Film. But Don't Worry: Cage Has Some Good Movies In The Pipeline Too.

By Tori Preston | Film | May 17, 2019 |

By Tori Preston | Film | May 17, 2019 |


Nic Cage Getty 1078974542 (1).jpg

Being a Nic Cage fan has always been an exercise in exasperation. The same qualities that make the actor exciting — his balls-to-the-wall unpredictability and willingness to do basically anything — also make his filmography a scattershot mess. A quick scan of his IMDb shows that he was in a staggering 5 films in 2017, and 6 films in 2018 if you include his appearances in Teen Titans GO! To The Movies and Spider-Man: Into The Spider-Verse (and why wouldn’t you — those movies are GREAT). And if he’s signing on to that many movies each year, it’s no wonder that for every Mandy or Mom and Dad, or even Drive Angry, you’re gonna get a Left Behind. That’s just the way the math cookie crumbles.

All of which is a long-winded way of informing you that Nic Cage has signed on to star in Nick “Green Book Isn’t A White Savior Narrative Because Jesus Is The True Savior” Vallelonga’s next movie, a “hardcore cop thriller” called 10 Double Zero (which itself is just a long-winded way of saying “1000”). The film apparently mixes the “grittiness of old school Michael Mann with the cutting-edge style of Sicario” — only, you know, by the guy that won a bunch of awards for underscoring that racism is bad in Green Book.

Here’s the official synopsis:

“Set in the stifling heat of Louisiana, two police officers take on a personal vendetta to hunt down cop killers, but as they get closer to solving the crime, they find themselves targets of a conspiracy in the ranks of the police force as the investigation leads right back to them.”

Hey… doesn’t that… doesn’t that sound almost exactly like that upcoming Chadwick Boseman movie, 21 Bridges, only with a white guy in the lead?


AHEM. Anyway, the good news is that you can always just rewatch Bad Lieutenant: Port of Call New Orleans instead. And the better news is that Nic Cage also has some ACTUALLY interesting projects lined up, because again: that’s how he maths. Earlier this year we learned he’d be reteaming with the Mandy producers on an HP Lovecraft adaptation, Color Out Of Space, which will be directed by Richard Stanley (the man behind the infamous Val Kilmer/Marlon Brando version of The Island of Dr. Moreau). So, yes, that might be a disaster, but even if it is it’ll be a fascinating disaster, and that’s usually what I sign up for with Nic Cage movies anyway.

Cage will also be starring alongside Imogen Poots in the post-apocalyptic action/horror flick Prisoners of the Ghostland — the first English-language film from famed Japanese director Sion Sono. It’s being billed as “East meets West vortex of beauty and violence” and the logline sounds predictably, delightfully bonkers:

“When a notorious criminal, Hero (Cage), is sent to rescue an abducted girl (Poots) who has disappeared into a dark supernatural universe, they must break the evil curse that binds them and escape the mysterious revenants that rule the Ghostland.”

But what’s most promising is that Cage himself has apparently said this might be his “wildest movie” ever. And like, the dude made freakin’ Face/Off. When Nic Cage starts judging degrees of wildness, you know he knows what he’s on about.

I’d tell you about other movies he’s working on, but one of them co-stars Kelsey Grammar and another one has Ryan “True Blood” Kwanten in it, so I figured it’s best to focus on the positive. Point is, Nic Cage is going to be Nic Cage-ing all over the place over the next few years, as per usual, and if you wanna see him on screen you have plenty of options that aren’t being written by the Green Book guy.



Header Image Source: Getty Images