I can’t say Nicolas Cage is back because we’ve never seen him like this. Ever. In the last years, he is pumping a second life to his career leaving aside unnecessary action thrillers closer to being parodies and not products worthy of a movie star, to be part of epic movies called to be part of film history. It started last year with Mom and Dad (2017) [our review here], a horror thriller with a good dosage of action and comedy that had a different spice to what we were used of the Oscar-winning actor for Leaving Las Vegas (1995) a long time back. And this year Cage put his name high on the stars painted in blood and fire starring Mandy (2018) [read our review here], one of the most spectacular movies of the season and probably of the decade. An orgasm for all the senses where our hero gave what probably is the best performance of his life.
Now that he has found the right path, we can’t do anything but to have high expectations for his announced upcoming project, a movie called Prisoners of the Ghostland. This will mark the first English spoken movie directed by Sion Sono, a veteran Japanese filmmaker known for his extreme point of view imprinted in all his horror, thriller and dramas. Perhaps better known for his cult titles Suicide Club (2001) and Love Exposure (2008), other movies like Why Don’t You Play in Hell? (2013), Exte: Hair Extensions (2007), Tokyo Tribe (2014) and the artsy and bizarre drama Antiporno (2016) [read our review here] adorn a filmography rich in radicality, his insane personal touch, and a sense of criticism towards what the Japanese culture has become in the last decades. That’s why Nicolas Cage and Sion Sono, two unique specimen in their fields, working together is great news.
Nicolas Cage was in the 3rd International Film Festival and Awards Macao, in China, this past weekend. During a masterclass he was giving out to the audience, he revealed one of his projects for the upcoming year 2019 to be this Prisoners of the Ghostland. And, obviously, everybody opened their ears wide. He said “I’m thrilled about it! It’s unlike anything I’ve ever read before. It might be the wildest movie I’ve ever made, and that’s saying something. It’s out there. I wear a skintight black leather jumpsuit with grenades attached to different body parts, and if I don’t rescue the governor’s daughter from this state line where they’re all ghosts and bring her back they’re gonna blow me up. It’s just crazy. It’s way out there”. Yes, the official plot of the movie reads “a notorious criminal must break an evil curse in order to rescue an abducted girl who has mysteriously disappeared”.
Wait, what? Nicolas Cage is going to be some sort of Snake Plissken at the orders of Sion Sono? Is this going to be like Escape from New York (1981) with ghosts and demons? Not much is known about Prisoners of the Ghostland, only that it has been written by two not very known actors Aaron Hendry and Reza Sixo Safai, and that Nicolas Cage’s character might be called simply “Hero”. But to me, that is already enough to write down this title as one of the mandatory ones to watch once it comes out. And you all who have been reading until this very last line should do the same.
