2012 Cage Year

It's been a long year for the Hollywood Defender and tonight represents the last blog of the year. We made it to 100 and thanks for all your support. If it hadn't been for Nic Cage I don't think I would have made it through this trying year. The man is an inspiration to all. So the final blog will represent a thank you note to everything I love about Nicolas Cage in 2012.


1. His hair
2. His memes
3. Ghost Rider 2
4. Stolen
5. His Big Daddy rumors in Kick Ass 2
6. His dedication to his craft
7. His vow to pay back the government
8. The Hungry Rabbit Jumps
9. His masquerade mask wearing self
10. The tease of Frozen Ground
11. The Croods Trailer
12. The promise of National Treasure 3
13. The future
14. The comeback

Thanks Nic and to all his fans, let's hope 2013 represents another great year in Cage. And of course, the only meme I created all year.

Thanks, 

THE HOLLYWOOD DEFENDER

The Nicolas Cage Bucket List

This is my one goal in 2013 and I'm sending it out as soon as the new year permits. Saturn Films is Nicolas Cage's production company.


Dear Saturn Films:

This may sound strange, but being in a Nicolas Cage movie is the first thing on my bucket list. I’m not looking for a major role or a speaking role, I’d be fine with just being an extra. Nic has been my favorite actor for the longest time and saying I’m his costar would be a major life achievement. Please let me know if this impossible dream is possible. I will continue to write as not to be forgotten and check in on the progress of this request and so I’m  not forgotten.


Best wishes,

Jake Cannon

Live Like Cage in 2013

The New Year is coming with a big unlucky 13 attached to it. I’m sure we are all making NYE resolutions that we won’t end up keeping. We’ll find reasons not to do the things we actually care about and pay more attention to our minor problems than the life altering events. Can we affect change? We can. If only we live by the CODA of CAGE. What? Nicolas Cage? Yes. Nicolas Cage. The Nicolas Cage. That Nicolas Cage. How can a man who didn’t pay his taxes and hasn’t had a blockbuster hit in years be a role model for the coming year? I’m glad you asked.

The Coda of Cage can be followed in 3 simple steps:

1. Conquer your fears:
Do you know what Nicolas Cage hates? Bugs, with a specific hatred reserved for Cockroaches. What does Nicolas Cage snack on in a Vampire’s Kiss despite the fact it wasn’t written into the script? Cockroaches.
Most of us have fears of many things whether it be our bosses, our children, our futures, small elevators, and success. The best way to deal with those fears is close your eyes and take a big old bite out of them, unworried about the consequences. Cage took the plunge because he felt it was right for the character and the movie. Imagine that your life is a movie that you are watching. You’d be yelling at that character to do the right thing hurling popcorn at the screen because he doesn’t make the action move forward because he’s afraid. But in our own lives, it’s hard to see it objectively, we are way more accepting of our own inaction or we hate our inaction and focus the hate on ourselves.
Cage conquered a fear that he didn’t even have to. He forced himself to. Be the Cage. "Crush that Fly" and Bite that cockroach.

2. Don’t worry about other people’s opinions. 

In fact treat them like you don’t give a fuck.
Have you ever been at the gym and thought? I’m lifting weights too loud? I’m making too many splashes in the pool? Everyone must be staring at me?
Or on the road, am I driving fast enough for the driver behind me? Did I signal early enough? Why does everyone ever honk at me?
Or do I munch my popcorn at the movies too loudly?
The answer to these questions is that Nicolas Cage does not give a flying fuck if he does. Let me explain.

When Nicolas Cage did not pay his taxes, he needed cash, badly. He could have cashed in on a bunch of sequels to his most popular films: Face-Off, Con Air, The Rock,  and National Treasure.

What did Cage do?

He made Season of the Witch (plays a crusader)  and Drive Angry 3D (plays a man who escapes from hell to avenge his daughter by saving her daughter from the occult, while being chased by Satan’s right hand man). You don’t do that if want to make money. In fact, it shows how little you care about what other people think, especially critics. He made those films because it was what he wanted to do as an artist at the time. And as an artist he doesn’t give a fuck about what other people thinks. He makes art for himself.

Think about all the decisions you would have made differently last year if you didn’t care what other people thought about you? My guess is more movies than Nicolas Cage has coming out in 2013.

Live as if no one else is watching because it is your life not theirs. And Even if they are watching, who cares? Cage doesn’t.

3. Money isn’t everything, spend what you want.

To paraphrase Cage, he never want to be comfortable with my money because it will make him soft and leave him without the hunger for life and art. Cage blew a lot of money over the years on a lot of things, a Superman Comic and a T-Rex skull. And yeah the IRS are up his ass, but he’s the hardest working man in show business, while other actors are happy to sit on their money and release less than a film a year.

Money makes you soft. It gives you a sense of comfort that that doesn’t exist. The hard workers are the ones that need the money that need the success, but the drive is gone once you get to the top. Not with Cage, he fell to the bottom and is in the process of regaining his comfy life. And it has given him a crazy life that many envy. He’s relearning the difficult life and it will only make him tougher and more resilient in the future.

Live like Cage, it will change your life.

Rare Cage: The Boy in Blue

Based on the True Story of Ned Hanlan, a illegal runner of alcohol on his row boat, whose business goes under due to the same illegal activity. He is coopted into rowing competitions by another rower, but they become fast friends.

Cage plays Hanlan and worked himself into fantastic shape for the role, his body ripples with muscles like the sea in which he strokes his oars. It’s obvious that he jumped deeply into this role from a physical stand point. At one point he wears a sweater vest with bare arms. Fantastic! It’s hard not to wonder if he used steroids when he does sit ups in his blue Rambo bandana, every muscle tries to escape from his skin.

The movie like the majority of Nic’s early films is a light hearted affair, but also immensely enjoyable. Blue came in 1986 after his first darkly disturbing film Birdy with Matthew Modine. Birdy contains several scenes that still make you cringe at the possibility of what might happen, especially when Birdy is alone in the cage with the canary. It’s hard to imagine a movie from the 80’s that can still shock in that way, especially a seemingly simple drama.

Young Cage still has his buck front teeth with the seismic gap between them. His laugh is goofy and boyish and his light blue eyes resemble Paul Newman’s famous baby blues. His eyebrows come daringly close to connecting to forming a uni-brow, he’s unkempt, but not as fully as in his werewolf-esque appearance in Moonstruck. With all the creatures of the night movies recently, it’s hard to believe that Cage hasn’t played a werewolf, which he would thrive in without a doubt, imagine the transformation scene alone and tell me your Cage taste buds don’t click with delight.

The movie also marks the transition into strange Cage, later that year he was immortalized into meme history by his portrayal of Charlie Bodell in Peggy Sue Got Married. He’s never been the same after that and it’s been a great ride for everyone. 

Cage delivers on his promise to have a freak out in every movie and his shirtless body yells and screams as he almost tosses his partner over the banister of a steamboat. His partner Bill (David Naughton) is a dead ringer for Robert Downey Jr.

Nedlan is often carried on peoples’ shoulders when victorious, I assume this is the way that Nicolas Cage travels in real life.

Rockyesque training sequence with Cage was absolutely necessary in my viewership of this movie. I knew their would be a training scene set to music, but this is down right majestic.Thank you Blu Ray DVD production company from lowering the price of this film from 40 dollars to under 10, you are a savior. 

The Hollywood Defender

Zandalee: The Rare Cage

Farther and Farther down the Nicolas Cage Rabbit hole I go. This time to Japan, where I order a copy of Zandalee on DVD. Thank god it was my birthday because I was able to pick up 3 rare Cage films: Blue Boy, Time to Kill, and Zandalee. I will eventually break down all these films, however I begin with Zandalee because it’s DVD case is coated with Chinese lettering, not to look cool, but because this DVD was only available in China.Although all the reviews in Chinese on the box are unanimously positive.

Nicolas Cage reunites with his costar, Judge Reinhold, from Fast Times at Ridgemont High (yes I realize Reinhold was the star of that film, but I only remember Nic) for Zandalee, the story of an affair gone array. 

The filming reminds me of that of The Room, everything isn’t quite right, but Cage still steals every scene.

Cage’s hair is particularly bad, I’ve seen a lot of pieces on his famous head over the years, but you can see where it is attached and could be used as a broom in a warehouse.

Nic as a young actor has so much energy that he bursts off the screen, the frame can’t hold him. It’s like watching an animal video on youtube, you know something amazing is going to happen, but you’re still surprised when it does. Which is why Stolen was disappointing, Cage had lost his energy, there wasn’t one Nicolas Cage burst of energy like in Seeking Justice and Ghost Rider 2. Instead, Cage was content with the limits of the role, instead of finding actions that aren’t there and expanding it into something incredibly dynamic.

Johnny Collins, an artist, Cage plays the eccentric artist to a T, home run role for him.

Cage’s hair looks incredible, dark black and long, he looks like a villainous wrestler from the 1980s, specifically Diesel. Cage enters rocking out in a hallway rolling his head in a quite similar dance to that of the Face Off priest.

We open on New Orleans with a jazzy score and soon find ourselves in the bedroom of a dancing naked woman. All small budget films try to include nudity in order to land on Mr. Skin, one way or another your film has to have pop.

Steve Buscemi just showed up as a garbage man, is Buscemi bad in anything? He’s young and vibrant. He also keeps showing up for no reason.

Two more sets of boobs.

Nic wears grandma glasses frames, they look like the ones Charlie Sheen is forced to wear in Major League. And now, a new pair of glasses, small frames, black, sleek. He’s so awesome, it makes me regret ever wearing contacts.

“I want to shake you naked, and eat you alive.” –Johnny Collins

Cage uses the breasts of a woman as canvas for painting. These sex scenes almost equal Wild at Heart, but there is a soft core porn feel that places Cage in the same vein as Costner and Stallone…. And Cage is getting a blowjob… and Cage is humping on top of the washing machine… and in an alley… and on the floor. He’s an animal, Johnny Collins makes Castor Troy look impotent. It’s even better that this film’s cinematography looks like a home movie at times.

“This is duck is really succulent.” –Johnny Collins

“Let me tell you something about people. People die.”-Johnny Collins

NIC CAGE FREAK OUT at 1 hour and 1 minute. Awesome. Shirt ripped open, then sex in a church.

“You are really going fucking coon-ass, man”-Johnny Collins

Nic dancing with Judge Reinhold is priceless.

Great Cage freak out at 1 hour and 29 minutes. Covers himself in blue paint, it’s incredible. It’s incredibly incredible.

The movie looks like a student film, but Reinhold’s mustache is worth far more than its weight in gold. I think it’s a caterpillar or completely false. 

Nicolas Cage doesn't die!!!

The End

The Croods Trailer Breakdown

This is the 6th entry of 10 in the Cage Countdown to 100 blogs. Viva La Fucking France!

The trailer begins with Nic narration, already a good sign based on Cage history, remember how good Lord of War was? Yeah, so do I.

Cage’s character looks like a lumbering goof Neanderthal, but he weaves magical stories to children like no one else. I pray each night that Cage will record every children’s book on tape, so that my children can hear every story as it’s supposed to be read.

I like to believe that this movie will actually discuss the ills of curiosity i.e. death and that everyone comes over to Cage’s character’s point of view.  “Never leave the cave” is a great rule, this stupid upstart daughter can learn something from her father.

If you told me that Nicolas Cage would eventually say the words “Crispy Bear” in a movie, I’d tell you that it would complete my life and everyday after that phrase would be a bonus. Well, it’s happened, and not in the movie, it’s in the trailer for the movie! Which translates to: Nic Cage will be delivering a multitude of catch worthy quotes throughout the film.

 Other great news: This is a kids’ movie, and where there are kids, there’s franchising, and where there’s franchising, there’s toys. I’m going to get my first Nicolas Cage action figure! His character looks nothing like him, but that won’t stop me from re-enacting every scene alone in my room.

Is it wrong that I clap every time I see Cage’s name in the opening credits? It scares the other theater patrons, but it alerts them to greatness. It’s all about give and take.

 It’s a shame I have to wait for this spring for this movie, especially since the world ends in 2012. Stupid 2013 Nic Cage projects at least I get 1 more before the end of the year: Frozen Ground.

The last words are perfect: Everything Begins March 2013. The only thing missing: Everything Begins March 2013 with Nicolas Cage. It’s nice to imagine that we have all descended from Nic, the first modern man. I can sleep well at night knowing that through a fictional movie that Cage is my ancestor. I can check off becoming related to Nic Cage off my bucket list. 

The Hollywood Defender

Nicolas Cage: The Transition to Action Star

In Coda (wrote this in college, can’t find the citation, sorry Coda) mentions that Nicolas Cage is a child of Jerry Lewis. If there is any question of this relation, check out Peggy Sue Got Married, Nic’s performance as Charlie Bodell is the vaudevillian descendant of Lewis’ wackiness. In the movie, Cage operates in a world that doesn’t understand his broad actions, Charlie stands out “like a Tarantula on a birthday cake” to quote Raymond Chandler. He was heavily criticized for his portrayal and severed relations with his famous uncle Francis who left him out of Godfather III because of his artistic choices. Much of the same persecution Lewis faced for his broad comedies that were hated by American critics and worshipped by the French. I hate putting myself in the vein of the French, but the only thing that holds up in Peggy Sue (a bad Back to the Future) is Cage, he’s wonderful, charming, and over the top. When he is not on screen the movie drags leaving you begging for more scenes with Charlie.

However, Cage had more license than Lewis, who desperately wanted to make serious films. If you ever listen to an interview with Lewis, he’s an angry cuss obsessed with the human universality of comedy, which explains why he made the vaulted away The Day the Clown Cried (A circus clown is imprisoned by the Nazis and goes with Jewish children to their deaths-Imdb). Cage, on the other hand, has been able to dabble between serious and comedy for his entire career, even from the beginning. Then he did something even more surprising, he became an action star in the nineties.

 This begs an interesting question? What does the action film and the comedy have in common? The most well-known and critically acclaimed action films of all time are the Indiana Jones series, especially Raiders of the Lost Ark (1981). In fact when Indy runs from the rock in the beginning of the film, which is actually Spielberg’s tribute to Buster Keaton’s running away from large boulders in one of his early films. In fact most of Spielberg’s chase scenes are essentially the comic chase scenes of Keaton, but with more dire seriousness attached, they have their jokes, but also their inherent danger.  Comedy is also intertwined in the James Bond series when he delivers a punch line after someone has gruesomely died. He makes a joke on death to make his character seem less sadistic than the character Fleming had created, who was basically an assassin. However, the joke also reveals sadism while trying to mask it. The joke is vicious, but because it is about a villain it seems less so.  The comedy in action adventure films suppresses the drama and as an audience we are able to engage in the adventure without constantly worrying that our hero will die. Instead we enter the film usually knowing he will not, joy we get from watching a magician’s stunts. However, in an action film we are so instead of worrying about his death we wonder how he will escape his death similar to the able to see the magicians magic and the cleverness of his escape usually results in a humorous and clever escape. So in fact Cage’s transition is not strange, in fact it is much like the escape of an action hero in the film, for the action hero escapes using devices and connections that the audience has not thought of and evades his previous predicament. 

The Hollywood Defender