"The Unbearable Weight of Great Talent" - a light summer comedy and a bright role of Nicolas Cage
Miscellaneous / / June 10, 2022
Never before has a complex meta-cinema looked so clear and fun.
On June 8, a new film with the main meme actor Nicolas Cage was released on digital platforms. Even during development, it became clear that The Unbearable Weight of Great Talent would be very unusual. The actor will play not just another strange character, as he is used to seeing him in recent years, but an exaggerated version of himself.
At the same time, the not-so-famous director Tom Gormican (before that he had directed only This Awkward Moment with Zac Efron) did not turn picture into an endless stream of references, but simply filmed a story that is equally easy to watch for both connoisseurs of the film world and beginners viewers. And the second, perhaps even more interesting.
And besides this, in the film you can see a sincere and rather touching drama, because “The Unbearable Weight of a Huge Talent” is not just a story about an actor, but a message to all creative people.
Here Cage plays Cage, who is a young Cage
Nicolas Cage (Nicolas Cage) was once a movie star: he starred in
action blockbustersand in original works. But those days are long gone. Cage appeared too often in mediocre films to earn extra money, and now he sits without roles at all. He broke up with his wife, hardly finds a common language with his daughter. And he is also young Nick Cage (rejuvenated Nicolas Cage) and in every possible way scolds his aged version for the missed potential.In the end, the actor decides to quit the profession. To pay off his debts, he accepts a very strange offer: he goes to Mallorca for the birthday of millionaire Javi Gutierrez (Pedro Pascal). He turns out to be the sweetest person, and even a fan of Cage, who dreams of showing the actor his script. But the CIA claims that Javi is a criminal who kidnapped daughter of a presidential candidate. And so Nicolas Cage needs to bring a new acquaintance to clean water.
Already in the very choice of an actor for the main role there is irony. It would seem that absolutely any fictional character will fit into this plot. Friendship with a criminal and at the same time spy games are classics of cinema, remember at least “The Diamond Arm”, at least dozens of similar works from Hollywood. But then "The Unbearable Weight of a Huge Talent" would lose that same meta-humor.
Nicolas Cage, thanks to his grotesque style of play, has long turned into a meme - just remember the legendary sceneVampire's Kiss / YouTube from Kiss of the Vampire. Moreover, its screen version literally repeats the fate of the actor himself. He really managed to star in an endless number of films in the style of the "Bureau of Humanity" (has anyone seen him at all?) And for a long time he disappeared from the field of view of the mass audience.
After an insane role in "MandyEveryone started talking about Cage again. And now he has moved into a strange author's cinema, playing in the trashy "Prisoners of the Land of Ghosts", then in the depressive "Pig". That is, an artist with such career jumps is still to be found.
At the same time, parallels with "Adaptation" also suggest themselves. There, the actor played the real screenwriter of this film, Charlie Kaufman, who is trying to come up with a script for the picture. And at the same time, Cage played the role of his non-existent twin brother.
It's clear in advance that in The Unbearable Weight of a Great Talent, Cage will not just show off his worst sides, like Matt LeBlanc in "Episodes”, but will offer another performance, which will be based on the very personality of the actor. What he does. To begin with, repeating the phrase “I didn’t go anywhere” - as an answer to all the critics who talked about his return to Mandy. And after that, he begins to jump along the edges of that very talent, either playing very naturalistically and convincingly, or again hitting the grotesque.
Alas, "Unbearable Heaviness" is not as bold as "Adaptation". The screen cage still looks like a character, not a living person who accidentally entered the site. As if in a role that could become an actor's benefit performance, he was still framed. And the potential of young Nick was not really revealed: he appears only as a comedic cut-off, not greatly influencing what is happening.
Here it is difficult to say whether the author was afraid to go deep into metahumor or whether he deliberately did not overload the easy comedy. This will partly upset the critics, who in advance placed the unbearable burden of enormous responsibility on the picture and dreamed of the triumph of post-irony. But it will allow ordinary viewers to enjoy the film.
This is a soulful buddy movie
"The Unbearable Weight of Great Talent" doesn't stop at just revealing Nicolas Cage. Strictly speaking, Pedro Pascal plays much better in this picture and draws all the attention to himself in general scenes.
His Xavi is a completely sincere and even naive fan who met his tired idol. But he was not disappointed, but fell in love with him even more. It is on their relationship that half of the charm of the picture rests.
If we discard everything described in the previous block, it will seem that you are watching an adventure movie: newly made friends jump into the water from a cliff and run away from imaginary pursuers. And in parallel, Cage performs CIA missionconstantly doing crazy things.
But at the same time, Xavi's desire to interest the star in the script takes The Unbearable Heaviness into even deeper layers of irony. After all, the main characters are opposite not only in character and status. They are literally on different levels of the narrative. If Cage, in the image of himself, seems to go beyond the boundaries of the fictional world, then Javi, played by Pascal, plunges into his invented scenario, playing a role within another role.
In the text, this may seem complicated, but in fact, in The Unbearable Weight of a Great Talent, everything works intuitively. There is a simple basis: the meeting of two people who suddenly become friends. From this grows an energetic buddy movie, built according to all the rules of cinema: with well-timed plot twists and difficulties that have to be overcome.
But if at some point you think that the film has become too predictable, or even completely gone into another genre that does not fit the main action, you have fallen for the main idea of the author.
'The Unbearable Weight of Huge Talent' Turns into a Deconstruction of Cinema
In the middle of the picture, Nicolas Cage, trying to find out the secrets of his friend, will offer him a new topic for the script. Javi will argue that such an idea is not suitable for his story - it is too out of the plan. But Cage will explain that viewers need to be hooked on the genre cliché by hiding a personal statement in it.
In fact, at this point, the protagonist explains the whole meaning of the “Unbearable Weight of Enormous Talent” itself. And in this regard, I even want to put the film on a par with the Scream franchise, or even with the horror movie.Shed in a woods». The tapes of the first have long since gone from ironic thrillers to detailed lectures on the structure of sequels and reboots. The second one is called horror at all, which explains all horrors.
The Unbearable Heaviness is also partly a movie about cinema. Perhaps too frontal - the idea that the characters live in a scenario invented by them will be repeated several times. But if you look closely, the film deconstructs the very foundation of this art. First, it allows you to look at the work through the eyes of an actor, then - a character. But further, when it comes to the scene with drug use, it offers a view from the outside. Although, according to all the rules of comedy, the viewer will wait for a subjective perception of what is happening.
One can argue whether the director specifically abandoned the moves that themselves suggested themselves in the plot, or simply missed the potential. It all depends on perception: skeptics will find many flaws, or even get bored, but those who just want to have fun will appreciate the irony.
But Tom Gormican can certainly be commended for not turning The Unbearable Heaviness into an endless collection of references to other Cage roles. Only his main works are mentioned here. Although "Face Off" still has to be seen in advance, otherwise there is a risk of not understanding some very good jokes.
It seems that the director did not just want to express his love for Nicolas Cage and let him once again come off the screen. "The unbearable burden of great talent" sometimes refers to all creative people and just art lovers. Those who unsuccessfully persuade others to look "Doctor Caligari's officecentury old, proving that this is an interesting film. Who is forced to explain that sometimes you have to compromise and just work for the money. And just for those who at some point got tired of fighting the immunity of the public and decided to quit everything.
For them, Cage's mantra "I didn't go anywhere" can be a great motivation to get back to what they love and find inspiration in something new.
The Unbearable Weight of Great Talent is a film that can be called both simple and complex at the same time. Like the "Everything Everywhere, At Once" tape, it offers an unusual concept, but does not overload the action with references and ambiguity. In fact, this is just a pleasant comedy with dramatic overtones, that is, almost 2 hours of adventure, humor and, of course, Nicolas Cage.
Read also🎥🎥🎥
- 15 best movies about the mafia
- 35 most anticipated films of 2022
- 12 Most Anticipated Comedies of 2022 You Shouldn't Miss
- 30 best TV series that hit the top IMDb: from "The Twilight Zone" to "Chernobyl"
- 30 positive films to cheer you up
Best deals of the week: discounts from AliExpress, Yandex. Market", "VseInstrumenty.ru" and other stores