Nicolas Cage Made ZERO Wrong Choices in His Performance

I watched the movie when it came out. It was ok. I wasn't as good as the original. Kind of corny. But hey, it's a fucking remake and we're living in 2006, remakes are gonna be kind of fucking corny

But I never had any problem with Cage's remake. Until his performance in this became legendary for how "bad" it was. I went along with it for a LONG time. I didn't shit on the film or on Cage's performance, but I didn't defend him either

But his performance was excellent here. No lie, no hyperbole, no attempt to stir the pot

Imagine yourself in the movie Midsommar, which you all seem to love so fucking much. And you KNEW you were in Midsommar. You would act just as batshit crazy as Cage did in this film. Obviously, Midsommar didn't exist. But the OG Wicker Man did exist. And everyone knew what the twist was going to be. So Cage, if he is going to add anything worthwhile to a remake, if he is going to make a case for justifying the existence of a remake, he SHOULD act with the self-awareness that he is playing a role that has already been played, that everyone knows how it will end

He plays every single scene like a man who subconsciously knows he has been fooled and manipulated from the beginning and has no control at any turn and his destiny is to burn fucking alive in a giant tree statue

I do not believe that he phoned in this performance. I think this BS narrative needs a real re-evaluation. I get that it's funny to see him punch a bitch, to hear him scream "no, not the bees!", etc.

But has he ever come out and said that he made all those choices as a knowing joke? No. He is a true artist. He made the choices that he made not out of laziness or ironic humor, but because he was trying to be of genuine service to the mediocre movie that he agreed to star in. And he did that