Nicolas Cage isn’t scary, but ‘Arcadian’ is
“Arcadian” doesn’t quite employ a bait-and-switch technique, but it does draw you in with one thing and then keep you there with another.
Nicolas Cage in a film about a dystopian future in which hideous monsters come out at night to kill anyone they can find? Sure!
And this is indeed what we get with “Arcadian,” director Benjamin Brewer’s moody, atmospheric and entertaining horror movie.
But it’s a muted Cage, a far cry from his sceneryobliterating madness as Dracula in “Renfield.” And he’s only part of the bargain.
What we really get are outstanding performances from Jaeden Martell and Maxwell Jenkins as twin brothers, performances that more or less take over the movie, keeping one foot squarely in the horror camp while allowing for some effective coming-of-age drama, as well. Delicious and nutritious!
If either of those things can apply to hairy monsters with extendable extremities, who snap their jaws open and shut at a blurry speed right before they munch on your head.
I liked it.
What is ‘Arcadian’ about?
A prologue finds Paul (Cage) running through an unnamed, crumbling city where all manner of apocalyptic things are happening around him – explosions, ominous public-address announcements and him sprinting through alleys and back streets to the twin infants he’s stashed away.
They’re his sons. We catch up with them 15 years later, when Joseph (Martell) and Thomas (Jenkins) are living in a dilapidated farmhouse in the country somewhere. The decor is what you might call “Night of the Living Dead” protective – as night falls, they work together to secure the doors and windows. Then they settle down to a candlelight dinner, trying to put everything in a frame of normalcy – and for them, this is normal.
Then the noises start. Knocks turn into pounding, pounding so strong it seems the doors won’t hold. They do, but only barely. When Paul inspects the deep scratches carved into the wood the next morning, it’s clear that heavy reinforcement is a must.
At dinner and elsewhere, it becomes clear there is tension between the boys. Joseph is brainy; while Paul and Thomas rush to barricade the doors, he times the banging, looking for clues in the intervals. Thomas is more practical. During the day, he comes up with daily excuses to visit a nearby farm where Charlotte (Sadie Soverall, also excellent) lives. Their mutual crush – and a 10-second hug that is adorable – leads to Thomas having to rush home; he falls into a cave he can’t get out of, which sets the stage for the real horror.
Brewer is smart about how he deploys the monsters. At first, they’re an idea, more the catalyst for an all-encompassing sense of dread. There’s the “Jaws” school of horror, where lack of money and malfunctioning equipment forced Steven Spielberg to mete out glimpses of the shark, and the film was far more effective for it. Brewer follows a somewhat similar path with “Arcadian,” and like “Jaws,” it makes the payoff all the better.
Not just a Nicolas Cage movie
On the coming-of-age front, Brewer, working from a script by Michael Nilon, keeps things refreshingly cringe-free. There is a great scene in which Thomas and Charlotte share a first kiss. Her father catches them and angrily sends Charlotte out of the room. When they’re gone, the fear on Thomas’ face morphs into a sly smile. Forget the monsters, forget the angry dad. He’s happy, if only briefly.
The relationship between Thomas and Joseph is similarly well constructed. They’re competitive, and they’re sick of each other, and, like everyone else, they’re constantly on edge. There are horrors in the night, and they inform every aspect of life. The way their lives play out together seems perfectly realistic, given the circumstances.
One more note: At some point in any good horror movie, things need to feel overwhelming, as if there is no escape. There’s some of that here. I don’t want to spoil anything, but the monsters have a mode of travel unlike anything I’ve ever seen in a movie. I laughed out loud, more in appreciation than anything else. Brewer goes for broke and it pays off.
As does most of what’s in “Arcadian.” It’s not trying to make a grand statement about the world, at least not any more than movies like this do (any post-apocalyptic film at least implies things didn’t work out for us). But it is trying to scare you, and it does.