Unlocking the Cage

Shirley MacLaine plays a difficult former first lady, and Nic Cage is the frustrated Secret Service agent assigned to attend to her every whim. It's a cute 90's comedy that ends with… a 71 year old woman being kidnapped and buried alive? Liz Jukovsky joins us live in studio (a first for us!) and we all make a lot of intense eye contact while recording.

In this 2005 comedy cringefest, Nic Cage plays a sad sack weather man, who navigates both fast food projectiles and his strained relationships. This movie features Michael Caine playing an American, lots of archery, and far more discussion about camel toe than you'd probably like! Director Keola Racela (who liked this movie far more than we did) joins us this week.

It's John Wick meets Babe meets Mandy meets Chef's Table. 2021's low budget drama Pig got a lot of hype (and is currently Cage's best reviewed movie on Rotten Tomatoes EVER), but does it live up to it? We've got improviser Will Gianetta back to help us answer deep questions like, “What is a salted baguette?”, “How is this movie influenced by the myth of Orpheus and Eurydice?” and “Are there REALLY underground kitchen fight clubs?”. Plus, we watch the trailer for Prisoners of the Ghostland.

Improvisor Dan Chapman is back to discuss 2021's Willy's Wonderland, which pits a totally silent Cage against killer animatronics in a deserted Chuck E. Cheese-esque kids restaurant. Also, there's way more cleaning montages than you might expect. Plus, one of our hosts gives out their first perfect 10 overall score!

Rachel Jane Andelman, comedian, writer and producer of @2MBStudios on twitch, joins us this week to talk about 1998's Sinise/Cage's Rashoman-style thriller Snake Eyes. It's got gratuitous one-shots and POV shots as well as a big ol' TWIST. Is it stupid? Absolutely. Is it fun? We are divided! Plus, we play Snake Eyes (1998) vs. Snake Eyes (2021) trivia.

Is this a… well written, well made Cage movie? This Scorcese/Schrader movie from 1999 is about an ambulance driver slowly losing his mind. Also, is this movie a Chrismas Carol story? Actor and Comedian Rob LaMothe joins us. Say it with us: “I.B. Bangin'!”

Comedian Jeremy Weinreich has dressed up as Kick-Ass every year for the last 8 years so of course he's our guest this episode. Is this movie - a rare Cage co-star role - a raunchy, irreverent comic book movie? Or is it the tale of three extremely violent LITERAL CHILDREN who struggle with grief and daddy issues? Also, listen as Meg and Chris die inside when this movie ends up beating one of our absolute favorites in the rankings.

We’ve finally got fellow Nic Cage completist Adi Heller on our show! This movie has it all: gross plague makeup (so many boils), British people pretending not to be British, an extremely lose grip on European history, anachronistic buddy comedy, demons, demon wolves, possessed priests. Plus, we test our Nic Cage knowledge on Sporcle.

It’s our 30th episode, and we watched Lord of War (2005), a dark comedy where Cage is an arms dealer with questionable morals (okay… no morals). Featuring our first international guest, improvisor Josh Budman from Montreal.

Happy Mother’s Day, we’re watching a movie with no moms at all. Motorcycle stunt man Johnny Blaze (Cage) made a deal with the Devil to save his dad, it didn’t work out, and now he’s a flaming were-skeleton. He has to fight Wes Bentley, Dirt-dude, Soggy Boy, and Windy Dread Man for some reason. Anyway, this movie is… not as bad as expected? Ben Scurria of 2MBStudios and Union Comedy is here to dig into it with us.

In this week’s movie, Nic Cage, an Irish mobster gone straight, finds out that his daughter has been Taken! Not to be confused with 2012’s Stolen (where he’s  a jewelry thief) or 2011’s Drive Angry (where he’s broken out of literal Hell), this is 2014’s Rage. This slog of an action movie bravely presents bad accents, worse wigs, and truly stinky acting. Comedian comedian Shiyan is here to work through her Rage at having to watch this nonsense.

Our third and final installment from the 90’s Cage action trilogy (AKA the Beige Volvo Trilogy) is non-stop fun, explosions, guitar licks, dumb one-liners, and more than a few problematic bits. Featuring the most jacked Cage to date and possibly the worst accent he’s ever done. Andrew Barlow (@sirbizlow), the host of the Chuckleheads podcast, is this week’s guest.

Cage plays a hitman who goes to Bangkok for four last kills before retirement. Things are complicated when he falls in love with a deaf-mute pharmacist and runs afoul of his bosses. It’s a lot more boring than you might think! Featuring: a lot of elephant symbolism, very hot soup, and exactly one (1) cool action sequence with a boat and a motorcycle. Our guest this week is writer and musician Kenny Gray.

Cage plays twins in 2002’s meta-comedy Adaptation in arguably one of his best-acted roles ever. We like this movie a lot, but how does it rank against our current top three? Danny Prikazsky (from MTV’s Are You The One) is our guest and unfortunately, we’ve given him full access to the soundboard.

Werner Herzog and Cage get “edgy” in this 2009 movie about a Bad Lieutenant doing Bad Things. Is this movie cool and weird or just a Herz-slog? Turn on the iguana cam and grab your lucky crack pipe, because we’re digging into it! Featuring our buddy, Shane Taylor.

This already perfect movie didn’t NEED to put Nic Cage as a hard-boiled 1930’s black and white Spider-Man, but it did and we’re all the better for it. Plus, we do a bracket of Cage Freakouts! Featuring Twitch crafting superstar Alyssa Barrett Jackson (twitch.tv/bettermonster).

Let’s all go back to 1998 and have a good cry with City of Angels, the movie you definitely owned the soundtrack for. We have Meg Ryan’s Maggie, a tortured surgeon who rides Chekov’s bike and doesn’t ask a lot of questions about her mysterious new boyfriend. She falls in love with Cage’s Seth, a hirsute yet childlike angel who only has one outfit, can read all of her thoughts and literally stalks her. This will surely end well! Our guests this week are “guy we know” Dan Slimmon and songwriter and musician Rachel Kiel.

Nic Cage plays a Vegas magician that can see 2 minutes into the future.  A nuke is about to go off in Los Angeles, and the FBI needs his help! If you can get past the creepy romance between Cage (a smarmy weirdo) and Jessica Biel (20 years younger), it’s not NOT an enjoyable movie. Featuring actress and comedian Renie Rivas - check out her podcast Ring Ring! with Renie Rivas.

It’s Valentine’s Day in quarantine, so we’re celebrating by drinking wine and discussing 1987’s Moonstruck with Cage-hater and Cher-devotee Lara Drasin. In this movie, Cher falls in love with a 17 years younger, one-handed, opera loving and tortured Cage. The ensemble cast is great, the one-liners are classic (“Snap out of it!”), and Cage is in rare form - will it beat out Mandy for the top spot in our rankings? Listen and find out!

Is 1994’s It Could Happen To You a cute romantic comedy about a cop winning the lottery, or a tragedy about a woman who just wants to build a nice life with her partner while he has an emotional affair? 2MBStudios’s Lauren Chapman is Team Rosie Perez and honestly, we’re convinced. Also, did you know that there’s a Bollywood musical based on this movie? We’ve got the clips and they are super fun.

We’ve got so much to talk about this week! Teen Titans Go: To The Movies is our main event but we also cover a few of Cage’s very weird cameos (fake noses, cinnabar and all), as well as the wild story about the Tim Burton/Kevin Smith/Nic Cage Superman movie that never was. Our guest is the cohost of the 91 Donkey Lane podcast, Nate Lopez.

“They brought you into this world. They can take you out.” In 2017’s Mom and Dad, Nic Cage and Selma Blair (watch out for our spinoff podcast “The Blair, Which? Project”) are parents who are struck by a worldwide psychosis that makes them want to literally murder their children. It’s a very stylized horror comedy and dare we say… a bit fun? From a rant about anal beads to the angriest rendition of the Hokey Pokey you’ve ever heard, this is peak Cage Crazy. Featuring a great guest, TV and film producer Adam Bradshaw.

Nic Cage is the captain of a sinking ship, which is a great metaphor for this 2016 movie that is a disgrace to the true story it tells. Instead of watching this movie, watch the infinitely more compelling monologue about the USS Indianapolis from Jaws. But also listen to this episode, because it’s a fun one. Our guests this week are the cohosts of “Boy Detectives Presents” on Twitch.tv/2MBStudios, Anthony Zonfrelli and Will Van Antwerp.

This charming 1983 low-budget romance far exceeded our expectations and is a new favorite movie of our guest, singer-songwriter Molly Walburn. This episode we discuss scary clown dolls and even scarier chest hair. Plus, Molly performs a lovely cover of “I Melt With You”!

We’re revisiting a movie that our guest, Michael Trainor, watched when he was WAY too young. 8MM has a great cast (Gandolfini! Keener! Phoenix! Stormare! REEDUS?) that it wastes on a terrible script about snuff films and hardcore porn.

It’s Christmas! The perfect time for a Soulless Capitalist to find out what would happen if he had married his college sweetheart (and became the titular Family Man). Do you want this cake? If so, listen to this episode. Featuring Toonami’s Dana Swanson.

We watched this movie so you don’t have to. Featuring improvisor Mike Laderman, a thicc martial arts alien, Tony Jaa outclassing everyone else on screen and a whole bunch of CGI shurikens.

The Oscar-winning screenwriter of BlacKkKlansman (and Coen Brothers enthusiast) David Rabinowitz is our guest and we sure are glad to have him. In this movie, Nic Cage and Holly Hunter are two lovable dummies who kidnap a baby. Find out where this movie lands on the Cage Gage of Craziness vs. Good Acting (spoiler: it’s our first entry in this quadrant). Plus, we introduce Cage Bingo!

Comedian David Thomas helps us dig into the movie that spawned a million memes. This cult classic movie, about a 80’s businessman who gets bitten by a vampire (or does he?) destroyed the careers of almost everyone involved in it. It’s also Nicolas Cage’s favorite movie he’s ever been in. It’s truly a wild ride.

Let’s go back to the year 2000 for a fun car heist movie and a surprisingly restrained Nic Cage. With our guest, writer/actress Jenni Stukin.

Welcome to… our episode where we discuss… The Rock. This movie is so big we had to have TWO guests: improvisor Liz Jukovsky and San Francisco native Conor Allen. Listen in and find out what in ZEUS’S BUTTHOLE we rated the movie.

Is there a more metal movie than 2018’s Mandy? Our guest, improviser John Serpico, loves this horror-fantasy revenge film and so do we. Will it unseat Face/Off, our previous #1? It’s Halloween, so let’s cover ourselves in blood, break out the extra-long chainsaws, and find out.

Cage goes Disney in a treasure hunt through US history. Is it a good movie? If not, is it at least... fun? And what IS a knights templar, anyway? We’ll attempt to answer these questions and more with our guest (the man behind our theme song!), Will Gianetta, who has a pretty solid theory about the connection between this movie and another key piece of 2004 pop culture.

Screenwriter Brendon Bouzard joins us to chat about the this David Lynch / Nic Cage collab from 1990. It’s just as quirky, sexy, and cartoonishly violent as you’d expect, filled with fatal car accidents, a thin Wizard of Oz allegory, and Nic Cage indulging in his Elvis obsession. Also, we answer the question on everyone’s mind: is this movie the prequel to Con Air?

A FBI agent switches faces with a terrorist in order to foil a bombing plot. This movie has it all: campy acting, questionable medical procedures, explosions, and secret dystopian prisons. Is this movie as fun as we remember? Was Castor Troy actually… the hero? Improviser and Face/Off superfan Dan Chapman is our guest this week.

This week we’re discussing one of Nic Cage’s most critically acclaimed films (and one he won an Oscar for) - a story about a suicidal alcoholic and a “hooker with a heart of gold”. Does it hold up? Improvisor Patrick Gremillion joins us to find out. Content warning: substance abuse, suicide, domestic violence, and sexual assault - this is a dark one!

Meg and Chris invite guest comedian Laura Merli to review one of Nic Cage's craziest films:  The Wicker Man.  So get your bear suit and don't forget your reverse bee keeper torture mask!