Sundance: Social issues, crazy Cage
Blindspotting, Monsters and Men and Mandy.
Spoiler alert! This contains some plot points for Mandy, which premiered at the Sundance Film Festival and has not yet been picked up for distribution.
PARK CITY, Utah – If you’ve ever wondered why Nicolas Cage is Hollywood’s most meme-able leading man, look no further than the totally insane Mandy.
The action star was on hand for the premiere of his latest blood-soaked bonkers thriller at the Sundance Film Festival, where the vocal midnight-screening crowd was equal parts captivated and confused by the psychedelic fever dream that played out onscreen.
For the uninitiated, Mandy is the second feature from filmmaker Panos Cosmatos, whose 2010 debut, Beyond the
Black Rainbow, was similarly infused with heavy metal and sci-fi influences.
In Mandy, set in 1983, Cage is a stoic logger named Red Miller who lives in a remote wilderness dwelling with his misfit illustrator wife, Mandy (Andrea Riseborough). But when an eerie religious sect known as the Black Skulls wreaks havoc on their quiet existence and slaughters his titular soulmate, Red sets off on a murderous mission for revenge.
Now, before you say “Sign me up!” and stop reading, a fair warning: It takes a full 1 hour and 5 minutes for Mandy to bite the dust and an additional 10 minutes for Red to even take a shot at some of his wife’s killers: a demonic biker gang summoned by the Black Skulls, who have metal claws, orc-like features and an insatiable thirst for LSD. (Just go with it.)
In fact, the first half of the movie is a mostly plotless, sepia-tone slog, whose copious scenes of tree-chopping, pillow talk and creepy cult rituals prompted a handful of fest-goers to walk out.
But those impatient few may never know what they missed in those glorious last 40 minutes — a deliciously disturbing display of Cage butchering bad guys in all manner of gross-out ways. A few of the most memorable:
❚ When Red calls one of the demonic bikers a “vicious snowflake” and breaks the pipe he’s handcuffed to off the wall. In the blink of an eye, he bludgeons the creature and sends him tumbling down a metal shaft.
❚ When Red slices open another monster and guzzles his blood before snapping a Black Skulls member’s neck with a manic grin. To celebrate his first round of revenge kills, he snorts a small mountain of cocaine off a shard of broken glass and takes a dose of the dangerously potent LSD.
❚ When Red jumps off his roof and wages battle with an ax-wielding goblin next to a burning car in the driveway. After chopping off its head, he lights a cigarette with the flaming corpse.
❚ When Red comes at another sect member with a chainsaw, who just so happens to be armed with an even bigger chainsaw. Playing swords for a few wild, sparks-filled minutes, Red finishes the job by lassoing the man’s neck with his chainsaw and strangling him until he spurts blood.
Hitting the stage for a post-screening Q&A at about 2:15 a.m., Cage said the grisly showdown with the chainsaws was his favorite scene to shoot.
His sparring partner was “twice my size, so that’s pretty intimidating,” Cage deadpanned, earning laughs. “We had about three weeks of (rehearsal). I was still recovering from a broken leg and almost couldn’t do the movie, but we all practiced together and somehow my leg healed; through all the stunt rehearsals, it got stronger and stronger.
“So I’m glad I made the movie as well, for that reason.”