Nicolas Cage is Hollywood’s King Of The Bizarrely-Titled Movie. There was DRIVE ANGRY, THE BAD LIEUTENANT – PORT OF CALL NEW ORLEANS (try ordering that off Amazon after a few lagers) and BANGKOK DANGEROUS. It’s like the names had been translated from Dutch by a Nepalese yak herder and then sent to the printers via predictive text. Now Mr Cage is adding to his catalogue by signing up for PAY THE GHOST, just announced at Cannes.
What is the supernatural thriller about? Images abound of Cage in hock to a muscle-bound bailiff who just happens to be deceased! That’s not the lowdown unfortunately. In reality he plays an English professor searching for his missing son during Halloween. While the actor has the eccentricity required to play a convincing screen academic it could end up less a case of book keeping and more a cavalcade of butt kicking, depending on which mode we find him in. There is the Cage who so perfectly embodied the male lead in David Lynch’s WILD AT HEART and then there is the Cage who strutted about in a mullet for CON AIR. His motivations can be utterly mysterious – he attracted attention early in his career for eating a cockroach for VAMPIRE’S KISS and parted company with Michel Gondry on THE GREEN HORNET after insisting the villain be played with a Jamaican accent. More recently he’s been in vigilante mode for Roger Donaldson’s JUSTICE, so it’s never quite clear what sort of performance you’re going to get. For those unfamiliar with Big Bang Theory star Simon Helberg’s Cage take offs from Studio 60 On The Sunset Strip proceed here.
Based on a short story by Tim Lebbon (30 DAYS OF NIGHT) and written by Dan Kay (TIMBER FALLS), who has been trying to get the project to the screen for a few years, the film will be produced by Voltage Films (DALLAS BUYERS CLUB) and Midnight Kitchen Productions. The director will be Uli Edel, who many years ago subjected Willem Dafoe to waxed nipples via Madonna on BODY OF EVIDENCE and who also helmed weightier THE BAADER MEINHOF COMPLEX. Shooting is expected to start in the Summer.
Source: Variety
