(via justlikeclockwork)
I think everyone hates on Nicolas Cage too much. I haven’t seen Knowing, and I’m sure its not very good, but that doesn’t make Nicolas Cage a bad actor. I’ve heard Nicolas Cage described (many times) as a bad version of Tom Hanks. Well, I would LOVE to see Tom turn in a performance as gripping as Nic’s in Leaving Las Vegas. I don’t consider myself an alcoholic, so I don’t know exactly what it must be like, but I imagine Nicolas hits the nail right on the head. It’s one of the finest performances of the ’90s, no doubt, and let us not forget that Nicolas won an Oscar for it. I will also point to his performances in Martin Scorsese’s Bringing Out The Dead, Oliver Stone’s World Trade Center, Verbinski’s The Weather Man, and his Oscar-nominated dual performance in Adaptation (in that film, Nic is on screen as two different characters at the same time and his performance is so nuanced and exact that the viewer is still able to tell them apart). Now, naysayers will of course mention The Wicker Man, GhostRider, Con Air, It Could Happen To You, etc. I can’t say that I’ve enjoyed every movie that Nic has been a part of, but my argument here is that Nicolas Cage has earned the right to take a paycheck every now and then because of the great work he does in smaller films. It should be noted that the National Treasure movies have taken in almost $400 million domestically, and Knowing has taken in almost $60 million in just a few short weeks. How can anyone fault him for taking those roles if the movies are sure to bring in that much money? His appeal is undeniable, despite the reviews, because of how interesting his performances always are and I am excited to see what his future holds.
