Nicolas Cage’s career took a major upturn with last year’s Pig that garnered him a lot of Oscar talk. There are some other gems in recent years such as Joe and Willy’s Wonderland, but, on the whole, the last 20 years have seen him in mostly trashy, straight to DVD/streaming action movies. It is that part of his career that is mostly sent up in The Unbearable Weight of Massive Talent.
Playing a version of himself, Cage reluctantly agrees to travel to Mallorca to attend the birthday party of the wealthy olive grower, Javi (Pedro Pascal), with the $1 million dollar fee alleviating his money issues. Whilst there, he is recruited by the CIA to spy on Javi as they believe he is the head of a drugs cartel who have kidnapped a politician’s daughter.
What we have then, is an old fashioned comedy/action film with a twist that involves Cage lampooning himself and his films at every opportunity. It may be a joke that is stretched thin over the course of a 100 minute movie, but there are a lot of gags that hit the mark and Cage is clearly having a blast.
Rating: 7 out of 10