Cage as a Crutch
'Longlegs' is the latest film to treat one of our best actors like a novelty item.
For the uninitiated, it’s easy to dismiss Nicolas Cage as an A-list actor who fell from grace. He was leading box office hits like The Rock and National Treasure, he won an Oscar for Best Actor for his performance in Leaving Las Vegas, and then all of a sudden he was no longer in big movies but rather a mainstay of direct-to-video dreck. This is because he was in a deep hole of debt, and had to dig himself out. There’s no shame in that, and even when doing these low-budget features, he was never phoning it in. He’s a guy who loves to act, and interviews with directors who worked with him in the past all note his professionalism and preparedness. He comes to set knowing his lines, with questions about his character, and ready to put in the hours. But if you only look at Cage in the macro, you see the big choices and the quick paychecks.
Thankfully, some directors know that Cage isn’t simply a walking meme or supercut of big moments. Buried in between forgotten Cage movies like Pay the Ghost, USS Indianapolis: Men of Courage, and Rage you have some of his best work in David Gordon Green’s Joe, Panos Cosmatos’ Mandy, and Michael Sarnoski’s Pig. If Cage is consistently giving great (albeit perhaps overlooked) performances and is showing up to work no matter the material, then why do so many movies fail to utilize him properly?
This weekend’s Longlegs provides a good example of what happens when directors don’t seem to have a clear idea of what they want from Cage. Oz Perkins’ new movie is an exercise in atmosphere but without any of the depth of the films it seeks to emulate like Silence of the Lambs or Seven. Both the movie and the marketing go to great lengths to conceal Cage as if his performance is so extreme it must be seen and only surfaces about halfway through the film because audiences simply cannot handle it. And what is the performance? It’s largely Cage in white pancake makeup, a lanky white wig, some contacts, and being weird. He talks in a funny voice and is meant to be creepy. What’s odd is that Cage can easily be creepy, but like everything in Longlegs, Perkins only wants the most oppressive version imaginable.
That’s a waste of Cage’s talent. What other filmmakers understand about Cage is that he can convey a deep well of soulfulness and pathos if given the opportunity. And look, I love a bold Cage performance as much as the next guy, but they tend to work best if appropriate to the material. His turn in Vampire’s Kiss is unhinged, but it’s perfect for a movie that loathes yuppies and their rampant narcissism. Cage is doing a lot in Face/Off, but it’s necessary to delineate the personalities of his character Castor Troy, and his enemy Sean Archer when the two swap places.
Too many other movies want Cage to simply be loud and distinctive. That may be good for marketing, but it tends to lead to performances that become ends in themselves. When used properly, Cage’s work illuminates the entire movie. He’s in service to the story. But in Longlegs, he’s doing a lot to be oddly unremarkable. That’s because his character—a kind of fairy tale monster mashed up into a Satanic Panic narrative—has no levels or depths. He exists to unsettle, and while in the broadest strokes, this may serve Perkins’ goal of telling a story about evil in the world, the lack of specificity is precisely what dooms the character.
As I noted in my midweek update, the most unsettling performance in the movie doesn’t come from Cage, but from Kiernan Shipka, who gets to play her performance quietly and with a matter-of-fact tone that serves to juxtapose the madness of her words. The fear comes from the dissonance whereas everything Cage is doing is the monster in the woods. But looking at the totality of the movie, I seriously doubt Cage showed up to set in full Longlegs regalia and said, “This is what we’re doing.” His character and performances are completely in line with the unsettling atmosphere Perkins seeks to convey. The problem is that almost the whole film exists at that level, so there’s nowhere for it to go after the first twenty minutes. You can only be unsettled for so long before you’re like, “Oh, this is what the movie is,” and it wears off. By the time Cage finally gets his close-up, the thrill is gone.
I fear other directors will keep making this same mistake with Cage, relying on him more as a shorthand to audiences that something crazy is coming rather than realizing they have a terrific actor at their disposal, and they should use him to tell real stories. A movie like Mandy walks that line perfectly as Cosmatos’ movie gets weird and surreal, but never loses sight of the heartbreak and agony of Cage’s character. I understand the desire to let Cage cook, but filmmakers should come prepared with better ingredients if they want to showcase a great actor.