Nicolas Cage Punches First And Asks Later

A movie can be messy and still be fun, but The Wicker Man (2006) is a special kind of mess: it walks in dressed like a suspense mystery and leaves as a folk horror remake powered almost entirely by Nicolas Cage’s intensity. We’re Sean and Kylie, and we keep our Nicolas Cage movieverse marathon rolling with a film that has everything on paper a thriller should have: a missing child, a remote island, a secretive community, and a cop who thinks he can solve it alone. Then the decisions start stacking up, and the “investigation” becomes the real horror.

We break down the story beats that matter, from the ex-fiancée reveal to the island’s matriarchal structure and its honey driven rituals. We talk about how the script telegraphs danger with the bee allergy detail, why the setting feels shaky for a Pacific Northwest island, and how the payoff lands more like anticlimax than dread. Along the way we call out the scenes that accidentally turn into comedy, including the aggression, the meltdowns, and the moments that made this movie a meme factory.

We also zoom out to the bigger film conversation: what a remake owes the original, why reboot culture can feel lazy, and how changing the core theme can weaken the entire ending. If you love Nicolas Cage movies, horror remakes, or movie review podcasts that mix plot analysis with blunt reactions, you’ll have a lot to argue with here. Subscribe for the next Cage pick, share this with a friend who quotes “the bees,” and leave a review with your rating out of five.

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Transcript

 Introduction and Episode Overview 📍 Hi, and welcome to Second Emulation! You are in for a treat, because you’re about to hang out with my friend Shawn. He’s a huge fan of movies, anime, and gaming, and he has some of the best—and most passionate—opinions out there. So, get comfortable, grab a drink if you’d like, and get ready. Shawn is here to share his passion and take you on a total journey. Alright, here he is! I like to thank Emily for that great intro and welcome to another episode of Second Emulation. I'm Shawn, and I'm Kiley, my sister. And today we're going, we're still continuing our journey on through the Nicholas Cage. Movie verse. Movie verse, and uh, the movie we selected, we picked. Discussing Previous Movie Choices Wickerman because the one we had watched previously, we've seen it, which was we will mention it as a eight millimeter, and we felt like. Based on the subject matter and what we watched, it didn't feel like we should probably review it, even though there's other people who probably seen the movie and possibly gave their own review. We didn't feel comfortable talking about it just because of the overall arching subject matter. So yeah, we had, we, it's been three foam since that foam. We had to really cleanse our palette from eight millimeter. Correct. So like we had to reselect pick two new ones. So. Wicker Man's the one that we decided to, uh, we also watched, um, Bangkok, dangerous and what was the other one? Mandy. Mandy before. Introduction to 'The Wicker Man' And then, and then the Wicker Man, which if people don't know, is actually a remake of a movie from the 1970s, which I learned from my friend. It came out in 2006 Stars, Nick Cage. I did not know this was a remake. You didn't know this was a remake. No. No. But doesn't that make it worse? Yes. But also I also, I wanna know what was the, the prior film, like, was it the quality of the movie the original, bad or Good, and what? Con what condone them to like, Hey, we need to remake this with Nick Cage. I think the, that people just in, especially in cinema, they tend to have a very short. Attention span and they feel as though they should reboot things for every generation. Uh, we see it all the time. I mean, the Supermans, the Batmans, the, the constant needs. So I don't know if the one in the seventies was good, but I don't think it would matter if it was good or bad. They would probably recreated anyway. Um, but for, yeah, for people who don't know, it came out in 2006. It's, um. It's Stars, Nicholas Cage and Ellen Burstein, who I think is from, she's from actually The Exorcist, I think she plays the Mom and The Exorcist, the original Exorcist and Que For a Dream. She was in that one too. She's the, the older lady. And then there's a bunch of other people including Francis Conroy. And then this one chick who I'm pretty sure was in, never been kissed before, playing the friend. So I don't know if you know who that is, but that's the, that's how I refer to her. And the, I I do not, Plot Summary and Key Characters the movie is about if we're gonna just give people a brief overview, you should. It's, uh, about a sheriff who's investigating the disappearance of a young girl. From a small island that discovers there's a larger mystery to solve among the island's secretive neopagan community. They don't say this in the bio, but he believes that the little girl is his daughter. And for also reference, this is supposed to take place in the Pacific Northwest. Yeah, I was gonna say, isn't he on an island close to Washington? Yeah. Like Seattle or something. Seattle wa, Seattle, Washington. Again, another area where it's like. Just mystery. So we got twilight, we got vampires, werewolves we knew for sure wasn't filmed here. And wickerman out there somewhere. Wickerman, uh, yeah. So it, by the way, I picked this movie because I thought it was going to be a suspenseful mystery, which is twice how I've been gotten by Nicholas Cage where I thought it was going to be. Well, first of all, I thought it was gonna be interesting. Not at all, in my opinion. But even more than that, I thought it would be like a central mystery and it, there wasn't that. So I guess let's get into it. And he's a sheriff? He's a sheriff, yeah. I think in Seattle or in the, maybe not in Seattle. 'cause we don't have sheriffs in the city, but like on the outskirts that he's supposed to be in the Pacific Northwest and he's visited by his what ex-fiance or ex-girlfriend or something of that accord. I, I don't know if he, if he's a sheriff in Washington, but I think he's like in California. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. You're right, you're right. He's somewhere on the West coast and so, but where she is is up in Yes, here on one of the islands. It's either Woodby Island or Mercer or Bainbridge, whatever. I think it's Whidby, but. It doesn't matter. Investigation Begins on the Island Uh, it's an island off the coast of Washington and his ex-fiance, who I guess he was engaged to or who had left him abruptly or something like that, comes and tells, asks him for help to find her daughter who she then tells him is his daughter. And so he decides to go investigate on his own with no. DI mean, right off the bat he makes poor decisions. We'll just leave at that. Yeah. Poor decisions as a cop. Even more poor decisions because, well, doesn't he take vacation time and then like goes, but doesn't tell anyone where he's going? I maybe, but he's flashing his badge. He's like, I'm on police duty official duty, and he's telling him I'm off. So even if he is quote unquote off. Off the clock taking vacation. This whole investigation is just null and void because he is off, presumably off the clock on vacation time. No, he's off the clock for sure. There's no way they sanction this. They, they don't want them to know that he's going there so he doesn't tell anyone. So he's doing police business off of. When he is not working, which is the first red flag of a policeman, which I mean, of course we can all be detectives in their spare time. Doesn't mean we're all good at it. Uh, well this is the second time he's played a police officer. He's actually played a police officer quite a few times. You would think he's done like 140 movies. You think Nick Cage. Who's played a police officer in multiple different roles, which basically gives him the same skills as a police officer. Yeah. And he should be like, Hey man, you should tell the director, I don't think this is what a cop would actually do. Well, I mean, not to hate on, uh, the police force, but, uh, acap it doesn't actually take that much to become a police officer, unfortunately. I think it's what, like 3000 hours or something like that. You need more hours. Ah, we need more hours to actually move up in a customer service job, which is crazy town. Yeah, but that's neither here nor there. This man decides to go investigate this on his own, even though there's a missing child, even though he thinks it's his daughter. He tells no one and he just goes there. He doesn't even look into whether or not. This is actually real, like it could potentially be real. Um, and he catches what I assume is one of very few ferries to the island. He does a ferry and, and then he has to get on a plane that takes him to an island. So it was a plane. I must have blocked the plane out. Yeah, it's a, he goes to the island and. He goes to a island and then he finds a plane boat that flies to the small island. So that in itself tells you like, and they're, he delivers goods to the town of the small island. Oh yeah. 'cause they're so like remote or whatever. Mm-hmm. And then when he gets there, he checks in at this motel, hotel holiday. Unraveling the Mystery No, he, it's like a. In, I would say, so to speak, and quickly realizes that there are essentially, it's not that, that there's no men, but it's predominantly women, and I think the men are, are segregated into, and put into like lesser roles in the community. If I recall, probably You don't remember, you weren't paying attention. No. Wow. I mean. I do because they were like gardening and stuff. It, it, it was a matriarchal society there, but they were almost like on the side of like an Amish type of community. Like they, they tilled the fields. We, we grow our own vegetables, we make our own jam. We do all this stuff and that's cool. But none of 'em have technology. None of 'em do all this other stuff. It was just weird. He shows up. He has no, um, no lead. He just, I believe he's walking. Does he have a picture of her? Maybe? Yeah, I think so. Yeah. So he is like asking around and obviously people don't want him there and mind you also. He has, I think this is where we, we are introduced at that scene is he has a bee allergy. Oh yeah. They talk about bee allergy. And mind you, a big thing about this island is that they cr they create and source honey or like rather they source honey. Right? Yeah. I mean, when he finds that out or when that little nugget of truth is, introduced to us, we're like at any moment. He could just died on this island. They could have just walked up, gave him a, a napkin. He could have wiped his mouth with honey, and that could have been the end of him, you know, and then no one would've known that he was out here. Well, I mean, that's kind of what's happening. Spoiler alert. No, not a single soul learns. Let's, uh, let's, let's get into it. The women are already supposed to be like, off putting and, or odd. It's very clear that they were aware he was coming, even if it's not clear to him. Yeah. It's clear to everyone. He's asking questions to all these people and nobody wants to help him, which he's just like, wow, there's a missing child and nobody cares. Nobody cares. And they, um, they don't. Seem to care. And that's because again, spoiler alert, the girl is not actually missing. And the end kind of, uh, results in, um. Yeah. And Nicholas Cage believing that he's helping this little girl, and he is not, he is actually her daughter, her father though. Climactic Reveal and Sacrifice Mm. We find out, and then he ends up being sacrificed in a giant thing where he is The wickerman. Yeah. They, they have like this Burning Man thing at the end, like Nick Cage did all of this only to be burned alive and kind of, cuss them all out at the end. And this is like his, his launching pad into Ghost Writer, I would assume. Yeah. But, but yeah, it was this movie kind of like emphasis of someone who's really, you know, serious about their job. Like trying to solve a murder and just no one giving a fuck. No one really cares at all. Um, and they're all kind of odd. And the ladies, no one wants to help him. And so he's going through to trying to find the girl who's missing and ultimately ends up believing that he finds her and she, it's just a ru she leads him to where he is inevitably sacrificed for these women. To get they're basically, they do these sacrifices to get the honey back for that they can source and then sell. So it's an island for women but run by women for honey. And they sacrifice men who they go out into the real world occasionally to get impregnated by. That way they can sacrifice them in their like of relation in a way because he was the father of the girl. So they, the women honeypot guys, they're, it's like, almost like, I wanna say the Amish, where they do I think rum skin or whatever, where they are allowed to go out into the world and experience it. Oh, I know what you're talking about. And then if they decide to come back, it's like that, that's a year, like a year of their life, they go out and they do the a. Mm-hmm. For when they're 18, they can go out and live in the real world. It's kind of like women who are of the age of. Fertile age will go out and who knows how many of 'em will just go out, have unprotected sex, and then like also just obtain the information of the guy they slept with, so that way they can like, in a sense, blackmail him with empathy. Be like, Hey, you have a kid. He's missing. Yeah. It's not necessarily a one night stand because they want, they wanna build a relationship with this person, right? Like he was engaged to her so that there's more of a connection. So more of a draw. And they are purposely, I guess we should say also going for people who are officers or within the, within some sort of legal. Um, role because even at the end they're talking to people who just got outta the police academy. So they're purposefully going for these individuals, likely because they're aware that they would be more likely to come attempt to investigate, investigate or would investigate or be willing to do so as opposed to a normal person who would just. Potentially call the police. Mm-hmm. So there's that. So did you, let's, uh, let's talk about it. Favorite and Least Favorite Scenes Did you have any favorite scenes? I think when he punched the woman, doesn't he punch like 11 women in the No, I mean, he punched quite a few. He's, he's punched a quite a few, but I think also just like him just taking their drinks, like their drinking and him just tripping out. He is on par with him. But yeah, I think one of it scenes like he's overly aggressive. People are watching him having a melt, like essentially a psychic melt mental breakdown while he's trying to survey the land and find clues and it's just happening and he just randomly punching people. Because they either spiked his drink or the drink that he is drinking, so it could be water or the meat they keep offering him and he's just made out of the honey again, comes back, could be, they take as many times as possible to tell us, uh, about their honey issues. And he also mentions his allergy, which. Why you would go, why that wasn't a red flag immediately? Who knows? But So your, no, your favorite is him. Uh, uh, uh, acting I'm acting violence. I, I'm not saying abusing women, I'm saying like, no, I know. I know. I'm just kidding. Just Nick Cage and action scenes, especially in this one where he has a commit, he's like overly committing. That's probably my favorite scene because. I think up until this movie, I don't know if there's other films of him doing action that are like, he's been in other action films. I mean, he was on Face Off or He, he's on face. Okay. So yeah, he's, he's done action, but like. Where there's no one back. Yeah, no leaning back. So it's just like him punching a wall. I'm just wondering how many times he had to rehearse this. Yeah. And these, these women, these actors would be like, okay, we gotta take it to the chin or pretend to get hit. I mean, they pretend to get hit. I think that would also probably be one of my favorite scenes too, is him in a bear suit punching somebody. Which in my mind I was like, maybe the person who, and you let me know. I think it's Ari Astor, whatever his name is, who created Midsummer. If he ever listens to this, you let me know if you watch this movie on edibles. And that's what prompted the bear scene at the end of Midsummer where the guy gets lit on fire in the thing. Because at one point Nick Cage is in a bear suit and at the end he gets lit on fire. So I'm just saying it's also culty vibes. It could be a callback. Yes. And also Colts like we had. A person that we know. Twice has been been in a situation where it's like a retreat. I to find out it's not a retreat, it is a retreat esque, but the people are kind of shady. Any multi-level marketing retreat is actually just a cult. Um, it's a cult of a mindset. And any, listen, anyone who's telling you the way that you can make money is by enlisting other people. It is a scam. Walk out the door. Mm-hmm. Go do something else. If you are working for free, it is a scam. Yeah. Like I feel like I have to tell people this, but you, it nothing if, if you are not, if you feel. You are doing all these things and it's not rewarding. Quit leave. Get outta there. If someone offers you jam, and they said they made it themselves and they didn't use any technology. They're like, I wa I was out there stomping the grapes to make this jam. Wow. Who are you meeting? Well, yeah, someone does that in just a regular day, right? But, but they, they, they tell you if it's a friend who somehow got into gardening and they decided to make jam, like that's probably fine. Still still red flag. It's a red flags red flag. I mean, people got into a lot of things during COVD. They were making their own sourdough bread. People were, we were losing our minds. We have a bread maker that we. Also have a hot cocoa maker. Yeah. We used, which is just a whisk, but you know, we used it a couple of times and then stopped. We have to get back into that, but we're getting distracted. And on a side point. So you what else? Did you have any other favorite scenes? I think my favorite scene for me is when after we, we established kind of like the location and kind of like. His kind of demeanor when he is interacting with the person. When he gets to like this bar lounge area, you can tell that he's getting distracted because, uh, one of the younger females kinda like he kind engages with. Distracts him a bit and he's like, you can kind of tell like his mo the wheels are already turning and like she's tempting him with this beauty even though they know that she's already like there. And you can see like other people are, they're aware of watching this. Yeah. And they, there's resistance. So I think it's not really my favorite scene. It's you have to pick because like you see, you're introduced. At the same scene that he has an aversion for bees because he has a bee allergy and you see that he kills a bee. And the people, the bartender and some they don't like that. No, they don't like it at all. So you kind of see that, that he's like drinking. And he is, oh yeah, I got this thing. Oh, B kills it. And like you can see the tension there and like. Okay. Why he doesn't also, well, you know what, this will be put into my least favorite zine categories when we get there. I guess I'll comment on that. I appreciate the weirdness of the island and the secrets they're supposedly trying to keep, it's very clear they want him to suspect something is off so that he doesn't leave. But also not be too loony tunes because you know that, and most people would cause an alarm to leave. I guess maybe not Nick Cage. 'cause he is Nick Cage. But yeah, I guess I appreciated the one girl who was in, worked in the inn, she was pretty cuckoo. Um, and he gets into like a, a physical bra with her, does he not? I believe so, yeah. And I enjoyed that. I thought that was fun. Looks like he had a good time. Uh, as far as the plot of the movie, I can't really tell you. There's a lot of favorites to it. No, there aren't. Uh, so let's, I I don't think we've got a lot on that point. Let's get into it. What are, what, what are your some of your least favorite? I think my least favorite scenes is, uh, him having a flashback. You, it was referring to the flashback of like, him being, uh, a patrol car and it was like. The daughter, the picture that they sent him where he remembers was in a car. He's like, for some reason they kept ref, they kept referring to this scene, which made no sense, and I thought it was just. Because he had been drinking so much meat or type of special meat or whatever they were giving him. He was having a, A breakdown. Like hallucinations, maybe? Hallucinations, yeah. Yeah. I think that could have been it. So they kept referring and it was like him as a patrol, highway patrolman. Yeah. And the car he would pull up in, I guess his car got into a car crash and his wife and daughter, it made no sense. And it didn't really, because he didn't have a wife and daughter. No. So he was just imagining it. Yeah. He was in that, he was a, he was hallucinating it, but it didn't, like the purpose of the scene didn't do anything because he would, he kept referring to it like, like a bad dream of, of sorts. Yeah. Yeah. So that's what I would say. It's not a bad, I, I would say not a bad idea for a movie, like when a cold thing is done, right. For example, again, midsummer, you can execute it pretty well. Because we all know that they have existed and probably will continue to exist, uh, where they're searching for people that are susceptible. But I think a few problems with the film were just aspects and my least favorite scenes. It just didn't necessarily a hundred percent make sense. It brought more questions than answers. And I feel like their goal was to give you answers with those hallucinations, but they just didn't make sense. Especially for me, I think. My least favorite scenes were, well, I had a lot of least favorite scenes, but I'll just say that I didn't follow, necessarily the plot as much as one would hope when watching a film. I felt like parts didn't really make sense. Like it's an island full of entire women and, and nobody's questioned this place beforehand. Mm-hmm. Like, nobody's gone there. They have to obviously. Have like that guy who delivers stuff, they have to obviously have relationships with the outside world. It's 2006 in order to maintain some sort of, import export process, right? Mm-hmm. Because they are producing a product. And then not only on top of that, but you're telling me that nobody prior to this has tried to go to this island to see what's going on. And they, they haven't thought it was, it was weird. Like, so those are the types of things that I was found to be not convincing. Also, him getting there and not bringing anything of his sort that allows him to rely on himself was also probably one of my least favorite scenes. Like he drinks. Their drinks, he eats their food. He's already aware that this place is supposed to be suspicious, and yet he immediately goes in and is like, sure, I will try all the things. It's just crazy to me. 'cause if it was me, I would've come that day. Uh, with the intention of also leaving that day and like, and be suspicious. Yeah. And look around and not like grab, not eat their food. I would grab my own items. So yeah. I didn't, I didn't think that was a real well thought at plants. It's one of my least favorite. Nick Cage's Solo Performance And for me it's not really a least favorite. It's just more so that in this movie, and there were other movies, we get a lot of Nick Cage just acting by himself. Yeah. He doesn't have someone like, because in this film you would think he would've encountered. Other people, like other women on the island for him to talk to. But during his investigation, he's literally by himself. We probably get him maybe when he has to come back to the lodge, maybe interact, but a lot of From the teacher. Yeah, and the teacher. And a lot of it is just him wandering the island. Nick Cage is really just holding this movie together. On his shoulder. It's just him acting by himself in the, an open field in the forest. Like he is just the director's like, action and you're gonna be by yourself. And that was Nick Cage, that the Wickerman, which is Nick Cage by himself from majority of the film. Well, I mean, he's been in movies by himself too, so. That, but those, I think, intentionally were meant to feel like he was by himself. Mm-hmm. I would say, yeah, I, uh, with his movements, you know, he was like, like Nick Cage. For everything we say bad about him. He's a very good actor, method actor, that he can say a lot with his body language. He commits. I'll give him that. Yeah, he commits. So I think that's why they feel safe with putting him in scenes, which is like him alone in order to carry to the carry the story. 'cause he's been carrying, I'm surprised his back doesn't hurt after all the movement. I honestly think that. He got more whatever was before they cut into the film, he probably got more screen time because he was probably the biggest star in the movie at the time. Lack of Investment in the Story And they thought it would be really compelling, but it again, doesn't set up, you have to have a certain level of investment, right? Mm-hmm. When you're watching a film. Either in the story or what's happening and you're not really invested in him finding his so-called daughter 'cause you're not really invested in him. And then you just see him yelling about and acting crazy and then shouting about bees and honey when he is dying. Which was also, I actually should say that was one of my favorite scenes when he was dying because it was so dramatic that it was like funny. Almost, even though it was a horrible situation. You know what it reminds me of, but it was funny because of his acting and so yeah, but one of my, I guess I would say one of my other least favorite scenes is I am not a fan of well, I guess I would be more if it was done well, but. The Female Cult Plotline I'm not a fan of the whole, the ladies are a vicious community of women who just take men and then murder them and then raise the children and they use them for all these things. That's supposed to be the horror of it all is that, and it just, to me is not, they're black whitting these people. Yeah. It's not horrific because it's not, and not that it's not real, but that's just not that horrific to me. There. So they sacrifice him for the honey. Okay. Like whatever, if you want us to believe that, sure. Fine. There, there are crazier things that happen in the world that to me was not, was not all that insane. It just felt like a really weird, uh. I guess they're the villain, a really weird antagonist to his protagonist. And you're not really invested in him, so then you're just like, well, I guess I'm not really invested in them either. Uh, so I'm just kind of in, it's Comparisons to Other Films almost like the village. Type ending were except the village was better. Yeah, but it's, it's, I wanna say it's a little bit, it's like it's supposed to be, it's supposed, the shock is supposed to be like M Night Sha Milan. Yeah. The shock is supposed to be like M Night Sha Milan, where you get the whole big reveal and you realize it was all a set up from the beginning that he should have left. The moment he landed where he asked questions and then left, because after that he was not getting off the island. So yeah. The Anticlimactic Reveal I hate to compare it to Midsummer again, but I would say that unlike with that movie, the payoff, it just, the payoff didn't feel the reveal. It just wasn't earned. Yeah. So when it, when it revealed it was anticlimactic. So you're just sitting there and you're like, oh, okay. As opposed to when you realize in midsummer that. The guy is going to be sacrificed and his girlfriend is now like supporting what's happening. That whole thing, like, you know, it's weird and you know, something weird's gonna happen, but when it gets there and she inevitably turns, then it's more of like a, more of a payoff in a way than here. I would say in this movie, I was just like, eh. Okay. It was more fun to see him scream about bees. His death also reminds me of his death as big daddy and kick ass. Okay. But that one was, was funny too. Yeah, I know. Nick Cage's Career Choices And I think he was supposed to be funny and big and kick ass actually really liked him and kick ass so he does see, he does films where you're just like, man, you could not be, there could not be a person who was more right for this. And then he does films where you're like. Were you just in debt when you agreed to do this? Because this script could not be good. Like I feel like this is probably his Yes. Era. Like during that time was like the Yes. Era. Where he was just like, I just need to do movies. Yeah. Because if you look at his filmography, it starts off with high times at Ridgemont High, like I think the first one, which had Sean Penn in it. And then it goes, and it was a Valley girl and that one was Pretty Valley Girl. And I think right before the early, like late nineties to early two thousands is when the movies start the choice in movies Start Sky, like where there's a whole bunch of. Stinkers and a couple, well, he did go through the whole issue with like taxes and stuff. He wasn't paying his taxes. So yeah, I mean, it makes sense, but it still is also just like Wowza. Issues with Remakes Also, I guess I would just comment that if you're gonna remake a film, and it hasn't, I think it, the prior film had been 30 years prior and it hasn't been enough time. Where like, I feel like it should at least skip a generation. And I feel this way about a lot of ho uh, like, Marvel movies and things like that. If you're going to remake something or DC at least wait for it to skip a generation because if. For example, with the Superman movies, when they were rebooting it, my mom had seen those movies and she had seen them all. Or us with Batman, we had seen the Batman of the nineties. We saw the Christopher Nolan. Then we saw all the, the additional ones that have come along. If you're gonna keep rebooting it. Either make sure enough time has passed that it actually feels fresher or make it better. That's my, my whole thing. If you're just gonna recreate the same movie or take key parts of it, make it better, or make sure there's been enough time where people have not seen the original. Yeah, because I, either way you're gonna get people who compare it, but if it's just the same thing, it's like, why did you remake this? There's no reason. To remake it. You're not re and putting anything into the, you know, into the film, you're not adding anything, which to me feels like such a waste because films like they're supposed to be, they're supposed to be something that distracts us from life and, yeah. I'm going on tangent, but basically that's all I'm saying, like. I don't think there was enough time between this and the original. From what I've heard about the original from other people, that one was way better. So if you're going to remake it, guy who remade this movie probably should have improved upon it and or waited longer, is my opinion. Probably or not. A lot of people probably saw the original, so he like potentially, so he is like, ah, well I'm gonna remake this movie and put my own. Moan spin on it With Nick Cage. With Nick Cage. Yeah. Most of the budget went to the Nick Cage himself being like, lit on fire. Yeah, no, just I feel like a lot of the, oh, like the, of the cost was for his rate, potentially rate, because like that could explain why we didn't see a lot of different actresses and actors and him just like out in the, out in the wilderness, just, you know, yelling into the air. And wearing a bear suit. But yeah, I mean a lot of these movies we tend to choose, we want to forget. And for like Nick Cage is very. Uh, he's very, becoming more prominent with just being alone and having a breakdown in certain films, like, and majority of films, like talking to himself, having internal monologues where he is talking out loud and just having a mental breakdown seems to be the most common thing that happens. And films, uh, uh, that star him just because like, it's entertaining. I guess so. Oh, okay. The Film's Setting and Flaws So I looked it up and apparently the original is a British folk horror film, which makes more sense. If this had been a film where they wasn't, I guess based in the, in the US I probably, or not even in the us. Well. I probably would have, uh, it probably would've been more like, of a possibility to me. Like the other one is supposed to be like on a Scottish island or aisle or whatever. Which makes more sense because. As someone who lives near the islands in Washington, there just isn't enough isolation for me to think that people are not gonna be aware of fucking people, sorry, people getting lit on fire in a giant wicker thing. There's just no, there's just no way to me that there's no awareness of what's happening over there. It's very easy to get to these. To all the islands on here. We do have to catch a ferry, but for the most part it's not difficult. And so it just would be, it would just amaze me that nobody saw him going over there. Nobody like the, the way that they get there so isolated, nobody is interested. It just, to me, was a big flaw of the film and they should have thought about it. I think they probably picked this location because we're the Pacific Northwest and also probably so they could film in Vancouver. Uh, and cut costs also. We we're foresty, but we're not that foresty, like you gotta go real deep into it and he should, they should have went real deep somewhere else. I think it also led to the fact they wanted to make sure that he, it was like secluded, so like you're going to AOC cult area where they, again, no technical, you're essentially cut off. And again, to your point. Nick Cage's Bad Cop Role He's just a bad cop. Yeah, he is. He is not very good at it. Maybe he's not like, maybe he's a good cop, but like they knew by revealing to him that his daughter is missing, pulled like some emotional thing with him. 'cause I believe someone in the department was like, yeah, we don't know about this. And. Told him like, maybe you shouldn't, you know, it's the weekend, I think it was on the weekend or something, or whatever, the timeframe to go down there. And they're like, nah, we'll run it, but yeah, he, his self-aware about the situation, self-awareness is, didn't tell him that he should be cautious. And this is not the age of before the cell phones, by the way. It's before smartphones, but this is, you have a cell phone. And I don't, I don't think service works there, but this is 2006. I am assuming that it is based around the same time. Did he bring a suitcase? I don't even remember, man. Yeah, he didn't. Again, it's just crazy. Also. Yeah. He doesn't seem like a very good investigator, so I'm like, you're a cop. We're a terrible one. He didn't take no notes. He didn't do anything. He didn't realize like I'm, he would just yell at people. A girl is missing like he did. Okay. He didn't like, essentially take steps to either protect himself, understand he's going to a hostile environment where there's an ongoing investigation or an investigation he's doing. So again, it was, the movie itself was pretty forgettable at this point. Yeah, I think we'll probably have to be like, uh, but I just wanna say, even if I wasn't in a cult island, if someone just. Runs up to me and is like, there's a girl missing. I would first be like, did you take the girl? Or would simultaneously be like, are you insane? Because, uh, and then third, once I realized that, I'd be like, oh, okay. Have you called anyone? Like, what, what do, why are you yelling at me in this random area? Like, clearly you've come across other people before me. To like to, to scream this. So, yeah, I mean, he's, he's acting a foul, but he, uh, he, you know, it, it is funny. I think I will say that at the end, he feels like he's got a real gotcha moment when he's like, I gotcha. Come here young girl. I'm here to save you. And they were like, haha, you walked right into our trap. Yeah, and they, they review and that's when the whole, like the smoke and mirrors kind of disappears. And like they tell, like villains, they took like, like they finally just tell him their plan and what they have. 'cause they know they're, he's gonna die anyways 'cause he's gonna be sacrificed. So that's when this whole reveal happens. That Nick Cage makes no no point to run away or escape. He just stands there and listens to them, tell you know him. Yeah, they've committed murders. Yeah they're literally confessing what they do. And h his first instinct isn't to just, I gotta get the hell outta here. You know what gets me too is doesn't he have a gun? I don't think I remember him used. Do they steal it? What I, I can't even recall what happens to it in the film. I don't know if he has a service weapon. 'cause if he did and he fired it, I mean, again. They might have it. He again he's in his off duty attire, so, and he, I'm not sure if he flashes his badge, but he, to your point, he's going around saying, I'm an investigation, I'm a cop. Yeah. He repeats that. But no one takes him seriously because they, ' cause they clearly, they don't care or. He's probably not the first person again. No, he's clearly not the first person. They do this all the time because at the end of the movie, the girl who previously he got one of the girls he got into a fight with that worked at the end and some, and I think his ex are back out in the city, and they meet James Franco and Jason Ritter who had just gotten outta the academy and they're flirting with him at a bar. Oh, okay. So it's. Preemptively, they're about to do it again. And this is what they do to re like, to sustain their community and, and all this stuff. And they're gonna, they're gonna create lives. They're gonna either be girlfriends and be wives and then get pregnant and the whole system all over again. They're not, it doesn't seem like they're wives. It seems like they get engaged and it doesn't seem like they get married. Yeah. To your, 'cause like they have to register the kid. When it's born in a hospital, they, I don't think the child is born in the hospital. They go back to their commune and have the child there because he, because he had to do a report that he did a police report. Like he, he ran like through the system and that's how he found out that they're like, oh, she may have a kid. He goes and run the numbers. And so he goes, oh, and that's what led him to leaving. That could have just, it could have just been that they filed a police report, but it doesn't mean that. That she was registered, I could be creating new plot for this movie. I know, like, I, I don't, I don't know, I don't even recall him looking it up. But again, I I, I was not paying a complete attention. Final Thoughts and Ratings So what would you rate this movie? Um, I give it a 1.5 out of five. It's not the worst one we've seen. It's definitely not the best I. Would probably watch it again if I was on an edible or was doing a drinking game with someone simply for Nick Cage. Uh, aside from that, I think it's a really forgettable like movie. So, and he does have a couple of those. He is not a, it's not his worst one. It's no. It's no some of these rural zingers that we saw, like the knowing or, and it it's in his film Rolodex. Yeah. Yeah. What would you rate it? I would it, I would rate it Just one star. Oh, just one star. Just one star. Because maybe I'm more forgiving for the small moments. Just, well, just one star because it's Nick Cage. It gets that one star for just Nick Cage being Nick Cage. Remember, this isn't, this is. This isn't Nick Cage playing a character, this is Nick Cage as himself. It's too true on a Tuesday night. Yeah. Yeah, it's true. Reading Reviews from Letterboxd And so we're gonna pivot over and we're gonna read, do some reviews. We've both selected two reviews from letterbox. We're gonna read their usernames and then read their rating and their review. You go first. Let me go first. All right, gimme one second. I gotta pull this up. So my first review is gonna be from user Jacob, who has like a dolphin shark and emoji descriptive. Yes, the bees. And Nicholas Case punches what for women in the face? Unprovoked. LOL. What? I saw that one. And I don't think he gave it, he gave it a heart, so I'm assuming. I think that's one probably that could, okay. So it could be one. But yeah, that was his review for it. Or maybe he didn't rate it at all. I, I'm assuming it's not a rating, so, oh, wow. This, this did not get a rating from, he just hearted it. 'cause he, he liked it. I guess he, or I think the hardest means someone liked his review. I, I think they just didn't, uh, I don't know. Yeah. I, let's just say it wasn't rated high. Yeah. In that we'll say it was barely a star. Yeah. How about that? Um, I saw that one too and almost selected that one, but I chose one by Jay. Uh, I don't know if you saw this one. Yeah. And and they gave him one star and they said, you didn't see Bigfoot, you saw Nicholas Cage in a bear costume. I saw that, which I thought was funny because that would be a Pacific Northwest thing. Sasquatch is huge over here. Mm-hmm. Well. It's a huge lore, I should say. Yeah. My second one's gonna be from the username, dumbs, Vil or Villa. They gave it a one and a half star, and their, uh, review is gonna be, I still don't know what the plot of this movie is. My friends and I did Nicholas Cage impressions the whole time. Yep, that sounds about right. Yeah. And I, I have to agree like. You could watch this movie, get up, go get yourself some popcorn, get a drink, come back, and you still wouldn't know what the plot of the movie is other than it's just Nick Cage yelling at people and punching people in the face. Yeah, and I guess I should say right before I read this I actually did a review by my friend Amanda, 'cause she commented on this and she goes by a swift. On Letterboxed and her review was two stars, and she said, Neil Le Lab Boot, which is the guy who wrote and filmed this movie, I, I assume, is fucking fired. This film didn't need to be remade and it sure as hell didn't need to be rewritten to vilify women. And that prompted me to then look up the original plot, which did not involve a full on female cult and was instead more of a religious cult where people practice paganism. Uh, and the officer who's going to look for a missing girl is a Christian, and the island has both men and women. So he specifically geared it for this, and that's why it feels off. Okay. Like it feels very different. I mean, they're still practicing paganism, but it, but it, the issue is not that they're pagans, it's that they're an island of women pagans. Because it is weird. It's just a weird thing to pick. Anyway, shout out to her. 'cause she said that it didn't need to be rewritten. And I agree, but I guess it makes sense. 'cause it was like not even a great carbon coffee. He just took one part and just carved it out and then like, this is like a skeleton of that movie. Yeah. I feel like. Now knowing that I feel like this, the reboot or remake is actually the first draft of what that movie is. Yeah, probably. And they also didn't they didn't deal with bees in that one. Theirs was like actual fruit trees and crops. Which makes more sense because Okay. A big thing with other religions, especially pagan religions. Is that, was it in the Pacific Northwest? No, it was in in Scott in Scottish. Oh, there you go. A big thing within other religions, like especially Pagans and Celtics and all that stuff, is you do sacrifice for your crops. Same thing with Mayans and Aztecs. They believed in that, so it would make more sense as to why someone would be like, we have to do a sacrifice for these crops to have a good. A good festive time, whatever, rather than we have to sacrifice for the bees. The bees are already dying. It has nothing to do with this man. The bees have a life cycle. They don't need your help. We're also killing them. If anything, it's humanity that's killing them. So yeah, so it was a weird pivot and I think it didn't be, need to be remained and I'm gonna go with 1.5 and that's that. Yeah. Overall, I think it was not a great movie. But then again, what part of Nick Cage movies are great? Again, it's like a rollercoaster ride. Nick Cage films are like a mystery jellybean box. You're just gonna grab one, eat it, and just hope you don't get the one flavored booger. It reminds me of that Lil Wayne Lyric, where he's like, life is such a f and rollercoaster. Then it drops, and then he says, but what should I scream for? This is my theme park. That's Nick Cage and his movie Discography. He's like, filmography. He's like, what am I gonna be scared by? My thing is all, all up and down, all across the world. And we're all over here just like oh. Okay. Huh. Alright. And that's that. Yep. Conclusion and Sign-Off And that's gonna bring this episode to a close. We'll catch you guys in the next one. Um, in the next next Cage film. Um, so you have any last words? Oh, I lost my hand. I lost my wife. What's his name? Tommy has hand. Tommy has his wife And that. We'll see you later. Bye. Bye. 📍 Wow, that was so much fun—a total vibe! If you want to see the full visual experience for any of the games we talked about, you can find all of that over on our YouTube channel. Honestly, the easiest way to find everything we do—all of our links, this podcast, and a super simple way to send us a message—is at our hub: ArcadeVeritas.com. It's our little home base for everything. Do us a favor? Tap subscribe so you don't miss our next chat. And if you're feeling extra amazing, leaving a review is the sweetest thing ever. It truly makes our whole community better. Thanks for hanging out with us. Remember: just take things one day at a time and find your joy. 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