Cult
favourite Nicolas Cage has carved out an eclectic and brilliant
career spanning the decades and across genres, with forays into
action, drama and comic book adaptations to name but a few. To
celebrate the release of his latest film, Dying
of the Light, out on Blu-ray and DVD from the 2nd
March 2015 courtesy of Signature Entertainment,
we take a look back at some of his greatest roles.
Dying
of the Light (2015)
This brilliant thriller, directed by Paul Schrader and
executive produced by cinematic wunderkind Nicolas Winding Refn,
stars Cage as Evan Lake, a desk-bound
Langley CIA agent, forced into retirement by signs of early onset
dementia. At the same time he discovers that his former nemesis,
Jihadist Muhhamed Banir (Alexander Karim
– Zero Dark Thirty, TV’s
Tyrant),
is not dead as has been assumed for the last two decades, but alive
and receiving experimental medical treatment. Banir's exact location
is unknown but with the help of a disgraced young agent (Anton
Yelchin), Evan sets out to track down
and confront him before it is too late for both of them…
Moonstruck
(1987)
This classic romantic
comedy won Oscars for Cher, Olympia Dukakis, and screenwriter
John Patrick Shanley, but Cage’s turn as the main
romantic interest cannot be overlooked. Moonstruck tells the story of
widowed
bookkeeper Loretta Castorini (Cher)
who has agreed to marry Johnny Cammareri (Danny
Aiello).
When Johnny leaves for a trip to visit family, Loretta is tasked with
attempting to mend relations between Johnny and his volatile brother,
bakery operator
Ronny (Cage).
However, complications arise when Loretta and Ronny find themselves
utterly and irresistibly attracted to one another...
Leaving
Las Vegas (1995)
Cage won a
Leading Actor Oscar for this film, in which he plays Ben Sanderson,
an alcoholic Hollywood screenwriter who arrives in Las Vegas to drink
himself to death. On arrival, he forms a bizarre friendship with
prostitute Sera (Elizabeth Shue) after nearly running her
over, and they eventually move in together... but their self
destructive patterns of behaviour threaten to drive them apart. Cage
famously admitted to being genuinely drunk while filming some scenes,
in order to add authenticity to the character.
Con
Air (1997)
Cage stars
alongside John Cusack and John Malkovich in this action
thriller, and plays Cameron Poe, a US Army Ranger, imprisoned for
involuntary manslaughter for seven years. When he becomes eligible
for parole he is forced to share an airplane with some of the
country's most dangerous criminals, including notorious serial killer
Cyrus 'The Virus' Grissom (Malkovich). When the criminals
hijack the plane, Cameron has to find a way to stop them, all the
while maintaining his facade as ‘one of them’.
Face/Off
(1997)
This cult favourite is
often cited as one of the greatest action films of the nineties- and
with good reason. Cage
stars as Castor Troy, a criminal genius responsible for the death of
the son of FBI agent Sean Archer (John
Travolta). Troy has
planted a time bomb that could wipe out Los Angeles - and refuses to
reveal its location. Troy's brother, Pollux (Alessandro
Nivola) is also aware of
the location of the bomb- so FBI scientists hatch an ingenious plot:
using experimental surgery, they graft Troy's face temporarily onto
Archer's head to allow him to question Pollux without suspicion. But
once Archer has taken Troy's face, Troy regains consciousness and
forces the doctors to give him Archer's face. Now Troy has
practically the entire FBI fooled, and Archer is stuck with virtually
nowhere to turn...
Gone
in Sixty Seconds (2000)
This
remake of the 1974 action thriller of the same name was a major hit
on release- and stars Cage
alongside
Angelina
Jolie, Giovanni Ribisi
and Timothy
Olyphant.
Cage
plays Memphis Raines, a brilliant car thief who has his retirement
plans delayed when his younger brother Kip (Ribisi)
runs afoul of a vicious crime boss. Raines agrees to steal 50 luxury
cars in one night, with the help of other car thieves, including Sara
"Sway" Wayland (Jolie),
in order to get his brother out of harms way. But first, he’ll have
to outwit a rival group of thieves, as well as evade Castlebeck
(Delroy
Lindo)
and Drycoff (Olyphant)-
the two detectives who are on his trail...
Adaptation
(2002)
Cage was
nominated for multiple awards, including an Oscar and a BAFTA, for
his role in this Spike Jonze- directed dramedy, in which he
plays screenwriter Charlie Kaufman, struggling to adapt "The
Orchid Thief," a non-fiction book about a fanatical orchid
breeder, John Laroche (Chris Cooper). Also starring Tilda
Swinton and Meryl Streep, the film was based on Kaufman’s
real-life struggle to adapt the book, and when writing the
screenplay, he honestly believed the film would end his career...
instead it won countless awards, including several for his brilliant,
innovative screenplay.
Lord
of War (2005)
This
film charts the rise and fall of arms dealer Yuri Orlov (Cage),
starting in the 1980s in Little Odessa, selling guns to local
mobsters, all the way through to the early 90s, where he formed a
partnership with an African warlord and his psychotic son.
Co-starring Bridget
Moynahan
and Jared
Leto,
the characted of Orlov is said to have been modelled on real life
arms dealer Viktor Bout, who became one of the world’s biggest arms
dealers after working as a Russian lieutenant, and was finally
arrested in 2008.
Bad
Lieutenant (2009)
This
remake of Abel Ferrara's crime drama was directed by Werner
Herzog,
and although it took inspiration from the original, it placed brand
new characters centre stage. Cage
plays the drug/gambling addicted police officer Terence McDonagh,
alongside Eva
Mendes
and Val
Kilmer.
The action takes place in a post- Hurricane Katrina New Orleans, and
focuses on McDonagh’s investigation into the murder of a Senegalese
family.
Kick-Ass
(2010)
This wildly successful
adaptation of Mark Millar and John Romita Jnr’s comic book featured
an all-star cast including Aaron Taylor Johnson as the titular
reluctant superhero, alongside Chloe Grace Moretz as the
irrepressible Hit-Girl. The action-packed comedy follows the exploits
of Dave Lizewski (Taylor-Johnson), an introverted student and
comic book fan who decides to become a super-hero, even though he has
absolutely no powers or real incentive to do so. Cage provides
wonderfully off-the-wall support as superhero veteran- and Hit-Girls
father- Damon Macready, AKA Big Daddy.
Dying
of the Light is available on Blu-ray and DVD from the 2nd
March 2015, courtesy of Signature Entertainment.