Nicolas Cage: Wizard

Ever since National Treasure, my friends and I have approached Nicolas Cage movies from one perspective: all Nicolas Cage movies are, in fact, real life documentaries about Nicholas Cage.

This explains two things about life as we know it:
1. It explains why Nicholas Cage's "acting" is more or less the same in every film. It's because he isn't acting, he is just living his life while someone happens to be filming.

2. It explains why no one is allowed to see the back of the Declaration of Independence.



I can hear you now, laughing off my theory like Christians laugh off evolution. "They can't be documentaries," you say, "they would have never been able to film that one where he is a knight or whatever because cameras didn't exist." Well did you ever think of this, you stupid monkey descendant? Nicolas Cage is a fucking wizard.



That is right, Nicolas Cage knows magic.

Case in point, The Sorcerer's Apprentice.

A cute little flick, and funny, too. In it Nicolas Cage must find the one person who is powerful enough with the magics that they will be able to stop the evil wizard Maxim Horvath from raising Morgana, the evilest wizard of all. Trouble is, the kid doesn't know he is a wizard and so Cage must train him.

"A-ha!" you say. "If it really is a documentary, how come that kid, Jay Baruchel, who was in such hilarious movies as Knocked Up and Tropic Thunder, is in this movie being equally as hilarious?" Now I must ask you, haven't you ever seen a look-a-like? Come on.

"Well" you say, nervously now that I have bested you twice, "what about the evil wizard Maxim Horvath? He looks an awful lot like the fantastic actor Alfred Molina who played Doc Ock in Spiderman 2." Anyone who is paying attention can deduce that Alfred is also probably a wizard, most likely a wizard who has given up on magic and devoted his life to acting in movies... but not this movie where he is, in fact, an evil wizard.

Now all you can do is sit back and wait for Nicolas Cage's next documentary entitled Ghost Rider 2.

I give Sorcerer 4 stars and an eye of newt.

Anvil! The Little Metal Band That Could.

Somewhere in my parents stacks of VHS home movies, there is a music video my brother and I made with some friends. The tape mostly consists of the lot of us jumping around in the backyard and pretending to play baseball bats like they were Flying V guitars, the point is we dreamed of being rock stars... and so did you. Admit it, you have stood in front of a mirror and pretended your reflection was a stadium full of fans, you have sung aloud in your car and maybe done some air guitar in the shower.

Everyone has dreamed of being a big ass ROCKSTAR! Anvil! The Story of Anvil is a documentary about a bunch of guys who never stopped dreaming.


There was a time in the '80s when metal was still a popular thing, when power chords and leather bondage stage getups were the shit, and twenty years ago, for 15 minutes, Anvil not only toured with the biggest names in metal, but led them, so it was a mystery when Anvil never made it big.

This movie is about Steve "Lips" Kudlow and Robb Reiner, the founders of Anvil and the guys who, even though they are deep into their 50s, refuse to give up on their dreams of stardom.

The movie is a like a real life version of Spinal Tap except less funny, a little sadder, and ultimately more heartfelt.

We follow the band as they go on a ramshackle tour through Europe, playing in clubs for a crowd of 5 people, yelling at club owners who refuse to pay and getting on each others nerves.

We follow them to London to record a new album with the only producer who ever made them sound good and getting on each others nerves.

We follow them to Japan and watch them get their moment in the sun in front of a huge, screaming crowd.

Their devotion to their dream of making it walks the thin line between sad and heroic.


3.5 stars with some head banging and throwing of the horns.

Up there with Up in The Air

Up In The Air, much like Wild Hogs, is a movie made for a generation that I am not a member of, so, on this rare occasion, I admit that maybe the opinion of someone older would be more applicable.

George Clooney is once again asked to muster up all his acting talent and play a slightly older but still very suave gentleman. (How does he do it?)

This time his silver-haired, lady killer character is named Ryan and he flies from state to state, company to company, firing people.

When an employee is to well-loved or a boss too soft, they call in an axe man. They call in Ryan.

You'd think this is where the meat of the movie would lie, that Ryan would struggle with the incredible emotional devastation that comes with terminating workers, but it doesn't. Ryan loves his job and he is rather good at it: he actually makes one or two people happy that their job is done.

The meat of this feast is that Ryan has made this his lifestyle. He lives out of a suitcase, knows the layout of all the airports, and has gone to some length to make sure he has no strings to hold him down. This all changes when young go-getter Natalie (played by Annie Kendrick) threatens to make his job obsolete, and when he meets the sexy Alex (played by Vera Farmiga), he starts to wonder if maybe he could use some real human connection in his life.

Jason Rietman, who also directed such quirky films as Thank You For Smoking and Juno, repeats his brilliance here. He does a job that so many other directors find hard: he lets the characters speak. Close-ups are used sparingly and there are no wide-panning crane shots -- the only time the camera work gets even the slightest bit decadent is the 3-second aerial landscape shots that are used for transition. The visuals don't make the film stunning, the characters do.

A solid film: dry, but with heart where it needed and an ending you don't often get in Hollywood. The only way I could have enjoyed this story of a middle-aged man watching the world go by more is if I was middle-aged man, but I am still in my 20s, so it missed the mark there (I'll forgive it though).

I give it a 3.5.

Aren't You Glad I Didn't Say Clockwork Orange?

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