NICOLAS CAGE is a cinematic force of nature.
Whether it’s a critically-lauded turn in Leaving Las Vegas or his big and brash performance in Face/Off, Cage always brings his A-game and always goes big.
Arguably one of the biggest movie stars on the planet in the late 1990s and early 2000s, Cage’s star has endured since thanks to the actor’s habit of “losing his sh*t” on camera.
So much so, in fact, one fan compiled a collection of Cage’s very best in-character on-screen freak-outs, with the resulting video racking up millions of hits on YouTube.
This summer sees Cage-mania descend on Belfast for a film festival with a difference.
Cagefest is exactly what you would expect it to be: a celebration of the wonder and majesty of one of the last truly bonkers Hollywood A-listers still plying his trade.
On Sunday, August 9, The Black Box in Belfast is hosting an all-day event featuring five of Cage’s most memorable turns.
Tickets are available for £5 per film or, alternative, £14 for the whole crazy day of Cage-based madness.
The festivities start at 11.45am sharp with Raising Arizona, Cage’s Coen Brothers-directed crime comedy caper about an ex-con who goes on the run with his ex-cop wife after kidnapping a baby. It’s funnier than it sounds.
Then at 1:45pm it’s on to Matchstick Men, with Cage on top freak-out form as a phobic con artist forced to contended with the arrival of his teenage daughter.
At 4pm, Cage returns of a bit of Marvel Comic book madness in the form of the frankly bonkers superhero effort, Ghost Rider: Spirit of Vengeance.
From there it’s on to Werner Herzog’s Bad Lieutenant - Port of Call New Orleans at 6pm, with Cage playing a drug-and-gambling-addled detective shouting his way through an investigation into the killing of five Senegalese immigrants.
Last but by no means least comes Cage’s action movie masterpiece: Con Air at 8:30pm, which tells the story of a newly-paroled ex-con forced to fight his way through a hijacked plane full of vicious criminals, led by John Malkovich’s Cyrus ‘The Virus’ Grissom.
A truly remarkable day of Cage-based action, anyone around Belfast at the start of August can book tickets here.
