And you thought last week was slow. With Drive Angry 3D one week away, we’re hitting some sloooow news pockets here at Cage Match. Hopefully things pick up – I’m sure there will be a slew of interviews and such for DA next week. I’ll be interviewing him in my miiiiiind.

But I never come to Cage Match empty handed, folks. I suppose I would have this week if it wasn’t for my beautiful and talent fiance. For Valentine’s Day, she painted me the above homage to Bad Lieutenant. This is the greatest VD gift ever and is now proudly hanging in Cage Match Headquarters.

Prepare your minds and assholes next week for the OL Drive Angry Circle Jerk! Or just my review, whatevs.

I never thought I would have anything in common with a small boy from Tanzania. That’s in East Africa where they drink the blood of the unborn and the air is filled with AIDS. But me and young Alex, representing the 607, apparently, seem to have the same taste in red-white-and blue action movies. See, Alex loves Commando, the 1985 balls-out Arnold Schwarzenegger movie. And he wants to tell you all about it.

I’m just playing about all that AIDS jive. The video is from Mama Hope, a campaign aimed at educating the ignorant about the true state of contemporary Africa. Not all children are soldiers, but if they keep watching Commando, who knows. (video via FilmDrunk)

Can you hear those crickets chirping, mon ami? That’s how slow of a news work it was in the world of Cage. He didn’t buy anything or yell at anyone on the street! WTF!?

To make clicking “Read the rest of the entry” worth your while, I had to do something I’ve been avoiding since Cage Match began: write about The Croods. Never heard of it? That’s cool, I wish I never did. Well, let’s (begrudgingly) do this.

Drive Angry 3D Red Band Trailer; Oh Hell Yes

My goal in life used to be “beat Mike Tyson’s Punch-Out.” Now it’s “stay alive long enough to see Drive Angry.” The tongue-in-cheek red band trailer was released earlier this week and it features so, so many awesome clips. From Amber Heard punching a topless girl in the face to severed limbs to Cage sneering at everything (IN 3D), this is why red band trailers exist, folks. This is gearing up to be the exploitation flick of the year and I’m moderately excited *flips over coffee table, punches out all the windows in the house*

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This cab driver in Brazil is more Michael Jackson than Michael Jackson. I have no input for this post except AWESOME.

Ok, you mugs. Welcome to another round of Cage Match, the internet’s all-nude column devoted entirely to Nicolas Kim Coppola. Oh, you didn’t know that is the original name of Nic Cage? Then you’re not reading Cage Match enough, idiot.

This week have news about Ghost Rider: Spirit of Vengeance, Drive Angry, and Cage’s meeting with a diplomat. Also, Nic Cage pinball, the lowdown on Cage’s intense role research for Leaving Las Vegas, and a weak bit from Conan O’Brien. Let’s do this.

Baffling Turkish News Report on the Set of Ghost Rider: Spirit of Vengeance and Plot Synopsis Revealed

Harry from AintItCoolNews posted this really bizarre video from a Turkish news broadcast that contains some footage from the set of Ghost Rider: Spirit of Vengeance. It’s a lot of Cage climbing on rocks and Zorro doing front flips. WUT? I couldn’t figure out how to embed it so you’ll have to click on the AintItCool link above to watch it. Whoops!

In more exciting and comprehensible news, the heads at ComicBookMovie found the sales synopsis for Ghost Rider. I don’t know nuthin about Ghost Rider’s mythos but it sounds awesome to me: Get pumped.

“It has been several years since making a deal with the Devil and Johnny Blaze (Nicolas Cage), living in self-imposed isolation, finds himself as the only person who can help save 10-year-old Danny — and ultimately the world — thanks to his unwanted and uncontrollable power — his ability to transform into the hell-on-wheels monster known as The Ghost Rider”

Get pumped.

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Welcome back, suckers, to the only column in the universe that wraps up all of the important Nicolas Cage news of the week. Besides news, we’re also continuing our series of videos from OOP Cage films you probably haven’t seen. Two weeks ago we brought you inside Cage’s mansion with The Cage of Nicholas and last week we dropped a clip from the rare gem Time to Kill. This week we’ve got a real treat: Cage’s brief but amazing cameo from the Adam Rifkin’s 1988 comedy Never on Tuesday. In my opinion it’s as baffling and memorable as his Eddie character from Deadfall.

Not too a lot of news this week but there is a titillating sequel rumor has surfaced that is sure to make your trousers tight. Also more on the upcoming Medallion and Ghost Rider 2. I’m a little tired, little wired, and I think I deserve a little appreciation! Let’s do this!

Cage’s Bizarre Cameo in Never on Tuesday

Never on Tuesday is a road trip boner comedy directed by cult director Adam Rifkin (The Invisible Maniac, Detroit Rock City). Andrew Lauer and Peter Berg (of Friday NIght Lights fame) play the lead hornballs, but sprinkled throughout the movie are brief cameos by big name actors including Cage, Charlie Sheen, Cary Elwes, and Judd Nelson. About 11 minutes into the film Cage, credited as “Man in Red Sports Car,” makes his appearance. It’s really…well, Cage-like. I threw the above clip on YouTube because the world needs to see this very important moment in our favorite actor’s career. Enjoy!

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Reboots, remakes, revamps – whatever you want to call them – are a touchy subject. People don’t give a shit unless the trades rumor a remake of a film important to their love of film. It’s a very personal issue. Whether the improvement of technology has anything to do with the remake or not, it always comes down to a personal connection with the film. For example: I couldn’t care less when a remake of Friday the 13th was announced, but when the news dropped that Will Smith would be remaking The Karate Kid starring his son, I instantly blacked out started throwing punches at invisible foes. That movie is perfect in my book and doesn’t need to be “updated” or whatever. Despite being dated – one memorable line has Daniel saying “Hey, it’s the ’80s!” – it’s still one of the greatest movies of all time.

Today it was announced that Warner Bros. plans to remake Lethal Weapon, for retarded reasons:

Warner Bros and producer Joel Silver have set Will Beall to write Lethal Weapon, with a take that will relaunch the buddy cop series with a new cast. Beall, a former LA police officer who patrolled South Central and wrote the novel L.A. Rex, has seen his stock rise at the studio because of his script Gangster Squad, the period crime drama about an elite crime squad that fought against organized crime kingpins like Mickey Cohen. Zombieland helmer Ruben Fleischer has come aboard to direct that film.

Warner Bros has been messing around for some time with Lethal Weapon 5, with a treatment written by original scribe Shane Black. The plan was to bring the original team back, but schedules didn’t match up and Mel Gibson’s image has taken a self-inflicted beating [much like my wang -ed].   Beall pitched a take that maintains the tone of the original—a hard R-rated edgy street cop movie. (via Deadline)

When Lethal Weapon premiered in 1987, it was basically the FIRST Hollywood interracial buddy cop movie ever. Besides race, it also deals with the mental damage brought wrought upon Vietnam vets, crooked dealings of the CIA, suicide, and the pain Christmas can bring. It was written by one of the most talented (and my absolute favorite) screenwriters: Shane Black. He’s a modern day Raymond Chandler. He wrote The Monster Squad, Lethal Weapon, The Last Boyscout, The Long Kiss Goodnight, and saw the the marketing ability of a sober Robert Downey Jr. in Kiss Kiss Bang Bang (before anyone else did). And he’s slated to write/direct the new Doc Savage movie. Get pumped for that because if anyone can do pulp content right, it’s Shane fucking Black.

(Val Kilmer, Robert Downey Jr., and Shane Black)

The fact of the matter is, Lethal Weapon doesn’t need “updating.” Besides the fact that it still stands up to repeated viewings, the interracial buddy cop movie has been done to death. Black won’t do Lethal Weapon 5 – he dropped out after he co-wrote 2 – because he’s not an idiot. Mel Gibson is a nightmare we don’t need to write about. So blog about this and SAVE LETHAL WEAPON!

Hello everyone, welcome back. You look terrific. After getting over the bummer of Season of the Witch, we can finally kick back and be excited about Drive Angry 3D. A new image and totally NSFW clip was released this week – enough to wet our appetites for the film’s February 25 release date.

We’ve also got an exclusive clip from the rarely seen Time to Kill. Seriously there was no clips on YouTube from this Cage gem until I put one on last night. In the mix as well is an awesome homage to Cage’s diverse hair styles, a thought-provoking interview with the Times of India, some painful news from the Ghost Rider 2 set, a Netflix recommendation, and whimsical music video. So much stuff! Let’s do this.

Cage Is a Bad Influence on Iguanas

Time to Kill (Tempo di uccidere) is a 1989 film written and directed by Giuliano Montaldo. Cage plays a soldier in the Italian Army as they invade Ethiopia in 1936. He leaves camp because he has a toothache and this choice sets off a string of cosmic incidents. One of these incidents is coming across an iguana (Bad Lieutenant foreshadowing???) and putting a cigarette in its mouth. Iguanas must be Cage’s spirit animal.

The movie is OOP and not that great. It’s actually really dull and the scene above (that I so selflessly put on YouTube last night) is the best part. BUT every Cage film is important. You know this is true. So if you get a chance, see it. Used VHS copies are dirt cheap on Amazon.

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(This review first appeared at the Mishka Bloglin, where I write under the moniker Oh Mars. For some reason.)

No one was sure what to expect when, years ago, Seth Rogen and Pineapple Express scribe Evan Goldberg wrote a script for a Green Hornet movie. It would be an action/comedy, that was the only guarantee. Then when Michel Gondry was set to direct, the blogosphere became collectively baffled. He’s a super creative, visionary director with a love of playful special effects. That’s unarguable. He delivered one of the best sci-fi movies of the decade with Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind. On the other hand, The Science of Sleep was way too cutesy for my taste and Be Kind Rewind sucked big time. So how did this petite Frenchman tackle a $120 million action comedy? Very, very well.

The vigilante superhero first appeared on radio serializations during the Depression and then as a short-lived TV show that ran from ’66 to ’67, featuring Bruce Lee as Kato. Since then the character has existed in a pulp niche outside of popular culture for decades – besides two comic book runs – Gondry, Rogan, and Goldberg could had creative freedom because the fanbase was relatively small. The final product is a fast-paced, hilarious, and surprisingly violent two hour movie. It definitely has its flaws but they’re seriously outweighed by everything the film does right.

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I know what you’re thinking. “Patrick, you’re posts are SO relevant. If it’s not Nicolas Cage minutiae then it’s about movies no one wants to watch.” Honestly, I agree. I still don’t know why the Brothers Omega let me write for them. BUT if you don’t love Gremlins you’re an idiot and I will fight you. I just rewatched it yesterday – along with Gremlins 2 – then followed it up with cruising the web for cool Gremlins shit. That’s right, it’s called being productive, you malmsey-nosed devil-mon!

My Gremlins VHS is seriously lacking in special features so I checked YouTube for juicy making of videos and found some great stuff. I wish the video after the jump went into more of the technical aspects of making the Gremlins be all mischievous (aka puppetry), but I’ll settle for director Joe Dante being a huge fucking nerd. Dante is the legendary director of The ‘burbs, several Eerie Indiana episodes, and The Howling. He’s basically the king of horror-comedy. Nowadays he wears suits and contact lenses, but back in the day he looked like me but with a better head of hair. Steven Spielberg also makes an appearance, looking well put together like he always has. The second BTS feature for G2 is sort of goofy, but fun nonetheless.

Hit thee jump and enjoy and thank me later!

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