Latest news with #Cage
The Advertiser
3 days ago
- Entertainment
- The Advertiser
Cook Up's Adam Liaw shows off his magic oven
One of the impressive things about this show is how Liaw and the guests can carry on a conversation while cooking. Well, it's impressive to me, anyway. If I'm putting a meal together, I have to focus on that and any potential discussion goes by the wayside. But the guests here - chef Mark Olive and Food Safari's Maeve O'Meara don't seem to have any problems with that at all. As a tie-in with it being SBS's 50th this year, they're making Special Broadcasting Suppers. Because the initials are SBS, geddit? For me, the winner is Liaw's Portugeuse roast chicken rice. Though it is a little jarring to see him put the chicken in the oven and seemingly pull it back out seconds later completely cooked. There's not even a hint of "here's one I prepared earlier". The only explanation is that Liaw has a magic oven. What has happened to this show? It used to be an oasis of wholesomeness in the oft-sleazy world of dating shows (yeah, MAFS, I'm talking about you). But in this season, things have gone really pear-shaped. Two farmers were allegedly axed before the show went to air for hooking up with other women during the production. So, more Farmer Wants a Booty Call than anything else. Now, Farmer Thomas appears to have been texting one of the women who had already left the farm, while the remaining ladies were trying to woo him. That saw him leave his own farm at the end of the last episode. And probably had the producers rubbing their hands with glee about all the plotlines this delivered. In tonight's episode, the farmers and the ladies are all going to a "Country Ball", which sounds like a rural tradition but is really a staged event where they are the only attendees. The big mystery is whether or not Farmer Thomas will come back to the farm or if the ladies will have to bring in the wheat themselves during harvest time. The title of this series about mixed martial arts definitely suggests some nefarious dealings. But that's not the case, at least not in this first episode. The episode deals with a fighter named Kimbo Slice, who became famous on the internet for his videos of illegal bare-knuckle backyard fights. That fame led him to look at becoming an MMA fighter - well, the fame and the fact he could make a lot more money that way compared to punching on with people in a suburban backyard. Once he developed some wrestling skills rather than just relying on his fists, Slice did pretty well in the cage. He did pretty well out of it as well, becoming one of the sport's recognised faces and appearing on plenty of talk shows. But he was facing some serious health problems. It was known that he suffered high blood pressure but what wasn't known is that it was linked to an enlarged heart. At the age of 42, when he was on the list for a heart transplant, Slice was feeling unwell and was admitted to hospital. Three days later he died from congestive heart failure. So this episode is more about the Sad Side of The Cage, rather than the Dark Side. One of the impressive things about this show is how Liaw and the guests can carry on a conversation while cooking. Well, it's impressive to me, anyway. If I'm putting a meal together, I have to focus on that and any potential discussion goes by the wayside. But the guests here - chef Mark Olive and Food Safari's Maeve O'Meara don't seem to have any problems with that at all. As a tie-in with it being SBS's 50th this year, they're making Special Broadcasting Suppers. Because the initials are SBS, geddit? For me, the winner is Liaw's Portugeuse roast chicken rice. Though it is a little jarring to see him put the chicken in the oven and seemingly pull it back out seconds later completely cooked. There's not even a hint of "here's one I prepared earlier". The only explanation is that Liaw has a magic oven. What has happened to this show? It used to be an oasis of wholesomeness in the oft-sleazy world of dating shows (yeah, MAFS, I'm talking about you). But in this season, things have gone really pear-shaped. Two farmers were allegedly axed before the show went to air for hooking up with other women during the production. So, more Farmer Wants a Booty Call than anything else. Now, Farmer Thomas appears to have been texting one of the women who had already left the farm, while the remaining ladies were trying to woo him. That saw him leave his own farm at the end of the last episode. And probably had the producers rubbing their hands with glee about all the plotlines this delivered. In tonight's episode, the farmers and the ladies are all going to a "Country Ball", which sounds like a rural tradition but is really a staged event where they are the only attendees. The big mystery is whether or not Farmer Thomas will come back to the farm or if the ladies will have to bring in the wheat themselves during harvest time. The title of this series about mixed martial arts definitely suggests some nefarious dealings. But that's not the case, at least not in this first episode. The episode deals with a fighter named Kimbo Slice, who became famous on the internet for his videos of illegal bare-knuckle backyard fights. That fame led him to look at becoming an MMA fighter - well, the fame and the fact he could make a lot more money that way compared to punching on with people in a suburban backyard. Once he developed some wrestling skills rather than just relying on his fists, Slice did pretty well in the cage. He did pretty well out of it as well, becoming one of the sport's recognised faces and appearing on plenty of talk shows. But he was facing some serious health problems. It was known that he suffered high blood pressure but what wasn't known is that it was linked to an enlarged heart. At the age of 42, when he was on the list for a heart transplant, Slice was feeling unwell and was admitted to hospital. Three days later he died from congestive heart failure. So this episode is more about the Sad Side of The Cage, rather than the Dark Side. One of the impressive things about this show is how Liaw and the guests can carry on a conversation while cooking. Well, it's impressive to me, anyway. If I'm putting a meal together, I have to focus on that and any potential discussion goes by the wayside. But the guests here - chef Mark Olive and Food Safari's Maeve O'Meara don't seem to have any problems with that at all. As a tie-in with it being SBS's 50th this year, they're making Special Broadcasting Suppers. Because the initials are SBS, geddit? For me, the winner is Liaw's Portugeuse roast chicken rice. Though it is a little jarring to see him put the chicken in the oven and seemingly pull it back out seconds later completely cooked. There's not even a hint of "here's one I prepared earlier". The only explanation is that Liaw has a magic oven. What has happened to this show? It used to be an oasis of wholesomeness in the oft-sleazy world of dating shows (yeah, MAFS, I'm talking about you). But in this season, things have gone really pear-shaped. Two farmers were allegedly axed before the show went to air for hooking up with other women during the production. So, more Farmer Wants a Booty Call than anything else. Now, Farmer Thomas appears to have been texting one of the women who had already left the farm, while the remaining ladies were trying to woo him. That saw him leave his own farm at the end of the last episode. And probably had the producers rubbing their hands with glee about all the plotlines this delivered. In tonight's episode, the farmers and the ladies are all going to a "Country Ball", which sounds like a rural tradition but is really a staged event where they are the only attendees. The big mystery is whether or not Farmer Thomas will come back to the farm or if the ladies will have to bring in the wheat themselves during harvest time. The title of this series about mixed martial arts definitely suggests some nefarious dealings. But that's not the case, at least not in this first episode. The episode deals with a fighter named Kimbo Slice, who became famous on the internet for his videos of illegal bare-knuckle backyard fights. That fame led him to look at becoming an MMA fighter - well, the fame and the fact he could make a lot more money that way compared to punching on with people in a suburban backyard. Once he developed some wrestling skills rather than just relying on his fists, Slice did pretty well in the cage. He did pretty well out of it as well, becoming one of the sport's recognised faces and appearing on plenty of talk shows. But he was facing some serious health problems. It was known that he suffered high blood pressure but what wasn't known is that it was linked to an enlarged heart. At the age of 42, when he was on the list for a heart transplant, Slice was feeling unwell and was admitted to hospital. Three days later he died from congestive heart failure. So this episode is more about the Sad Side of The Cage, rather than the Dark Side. One of the impressive things about this show is how Liaw and the guests can carry on a conversation while cooking. Well, it's impressive to me, anyway. If I'm putting a meal together, I have to focus on that and any potential discussion goes by the wayside. But the guests here - chef Mark Olive and Food Safari's Maeve O'Meara don't seem to have any problems with that at all. As a tie-in with it being SBS's 50th this year, they're making Special Broadcasting Suppers. Because the initials are SBS, geddit? For me, the winner is Liaw's Portugeuse roast chicken rice. Though it is a little jarring to see him put the chicken in the oven and seemingly pull it back out seconds later completely cooked. There's not even a hint of "here's one I prepared earlier". The only explanation is that Liaw has a magic oven. What has happened to this show? It used to be an oasis of wholesomeness in the oft-sleazy world of dating shows (yeah, MAFS, I'm talking about you). But in this season, things have gone really pear-shaped. Two farmers were allegedly axed before the show went to air for hooking up with other women during the production. So, more Farmer Wants a Booty Call than anything else. Now, Farmer Thomas appears to have been texting one of the women who had already left the farm, while the remaining ladies were trying to woo him. That saw him leave his own farm at the end of the last episode. And probably had the producers rubbing their hands with glee about all the plotlines this delivered. In tonight's episode, the farmers and the ladies are all going to a "Country Ball", which sounds like a rural tradition but is really a staged event where they are the only attendees. The big mystery is whether or not Farmer Thomas will come back to the farm or if the ladies will have to bring in the wheat themselves during harvest time. The title of this series about mixed martial arts definitely suggests some nefarious dealings. But that's not the case, at least not in this first episode. The episode deals with a fighter named Kimbo Slice, who became famous on the internet for his videos of illegal bare-knuckle backyard fights. That fame led him to look at becoming an MMA fighter - well, the fame and the fact he could make a lot more money that way compared to punching on with people in a suburban backyard. Once he developed some wrestling skills rather than just relying on his fists, Slice did pretty well in the cage. He did pretty well out of it as well, becoming one of the sport's recognised faces and appearing on plenty of talk shows. But he was facing some serious health problems. It was known that he suffered high blood pressure but what wasn't known is that it was linked to an enlarged heart. At the age of 42, when he was on the list for a heart transplant, Slice was feeling unwell and was admitted to hospital. Three days later he died from congestive heart failure. So this episode is more about the Sad Side of The Cage, rather than the Dark Side.
Sydney Morning Herald
23-05-2025
- Entertainment
- Sydney Morning Herald
I was having a nice day at the beach. Then Nicolas Cage turned up
It's a postcard-perfect day. The sky is a cloudless blue, the sand is golden brown, waves crash on the beach in rhythm, as I stand on the water's edge and watch Hollywood superstar Nicolas Cage attempt to force-feed a rat to a drowning man. I'm on the set of The Surfer, a new film from Irish director Lorcan Finnegan, shot in Yallingup, Western Australia. I am here as an accidental plus-one. When I got the call to visit the set, no one knew Miranda Tapsell had joined the cast. Such is my commitment to this story, I'd made sure to marry her seven years earlier. Of course, I leapt at the opportunity. Who wouldn't want to sit in and see what your partner actually does all day? Especially when 'what they do' happens to include performing alongside one of your favourite actors of all time. From childhood viewings of Con Air, Face/Off and Gone in Sixty Seconds (all far too early), to irony-fuelled teen years with The Wicker Man, to pretentious uni days spent analysing Adaptation, and finally, adult admiration for Moonstruck and tender oddities like Pig – my Nicolas Cage fandom has been lifelong, chaotic, and evolving. Certain expectations come with any Nicolas Cage film, as any fan knows. You cannot always guarantee it will be good or even comprehensible, but you can be certain it will never be boring. A media storm has followed this production, breakfast news tracking every movement of Cage and his family across the country, including interviews on multiple networks with the owners of Busselton's Food Of Asia grocery store, who had the honour of selling kimchi, rice and oranges to Cage. While I'm on set, there's a quiet fascination with Cage — his methods, his choices, his presence. All the things that make him unmistakably The Cage. I'm told a story of Cage quietly reading the paper, only to notice three passing actors with whom he has a fight scene later in the day, and announce to them that they better prepare for an arse-kicking. The grown men giggle with delight. Despite the erratic nature of his character and the 'Rage Cage' moniker his back catalogue has picked up over the years, Finnegan says everything Cage does is very thoughtful and deliberate. In The Surfer, Cage plays the eponymous Surfer on a downward spiral as he attempts to buy back his childhood home and surf at his local beach. 'We had lots of conversations in prep before shooting and teased out everything,' Finnegan says. 'Nick had some dialogue tweaks, which we included in the script, so by the time we started shooting, he was incredibly prepared and never needed to look at the script again. He also tracked his character's physical changes, like his limp and his voice becoming hoarse.' The Surfer 's antagonist walks a line somewhere between sandcastle kicking beach bully and tech evangelist cult leader. Played by Australian actor Julian McMahon, he bounces off Cage in that kind of part-seductive tango, part death-spiral. 'You know what Nic is going to bring is a lot of energy, and a lot of dynamics and a lot of creativity to his piece because he always has and always does. I can't imagine him not,' McMahon said. 'I don't know if it's the influence of Nic's energy that I knew coming in was going to be present but I definitely felt like this character, there's a beauty in the quietness and simplicity of him a lot of the time, and that would work nicely with the energy that someone like Nic brings to the piece. You want to take them on a journey. You want to push that boundary. I've always found it interesting, when you play a bad guy, to see how much you can get people to love you.' While I arrive too late to witness my wife's scene with Cage, Ms Tapsell did agree to grant me an interview (on the proviso I refer to her as 'Ms Tapsell'). 'It was absolutely surreal working with Nic Cage. He called a lot of the shots on the set,' she says. 'There was no rehearsal, we just had to go for it. Luckily, I knew all my lines. But he was very patient, he was very kind.' At one point, as cameras and equipment were hastily moved around Tapsell, she had to raise her hand to ask what exactly was going on. 'This man elbowed me and it was Nic and he said 'So basically, I am going to go over there and I'm going to kick some ass' and I said to myself, yeah, this is it, this is why I said yes to the project in the first place. I am in Con Air. I am in Face/Off. It's going to be one of those things that stays with me forever.' The Surfer features a strong Australian cast, including Nicholas Cassim (The Correspondent, Mr Inbetween) and emerging talent Finn Little. At just 18, Little has already built an impressive resume, from his debut in Storm Boy (2019) to a role in the international series Yellowstone. His role as Cage's son was shot as he flew back and forth between his year 12 exams. 'It sounded like a good role. Come to Western Australia, do a bit of surfing, hang out with Nic Cage,' Finn says. Like many on set, Finn had a favourite Cage film he was happy to chat about during production – in his case, the recent hit The Unbearable Weight of Massive Talent. 'To take the piss out of yourself in a movie about yourself ... It was a good film.' Producer Robert Connolly, whose expansive filmmaking career includes Australian stories from Balibo to The Dry, says there are creative opportunities that come with bringing the outside eye into Australian cinema, noting that Wake In Fright was directed by Ted Kotcheff, a Canadian. Loading It's clear speaking with Lorcan that he is a great fan of Australian cinema. 'Lots of early Peter Weir films were an inspiration to me in general when I started filmmaking, like The Plumber, Picnic at Hanging Rock, and The Last Wave, as well as Colin Eggleston's film Long Weekend,' he says. 'Wake in Fright and Walkabout were also key inspirations – and examples of non-Australian directors making very Australian films – so we felt we could continue in that tradition with The Surfer.' The quest to find the perfect location for the film started in Kalbarri, a six-hour drive north of Perth, and weaved its way down the coast until Lorcan and his team arrived in Yallingup, a journey of over 800 kilometres. There, they found a location so perfect it was as if it had been conjured by the script itself, somehow both claustrophobic and expansive, beautiful and dangerous. Connolly puts it simply: 'This is a film called The Surfer and this is a world renowned surf beach.' The turbulent surf and perilous escarpment provided a challenge for filmmakers but Connolly was determined to stay out of the studio. 'I've always thought that the success of high-end streaming has thrown down the gauntlet to filmmakers to make films for the cinemas even better,' he says. 'Shooting that wide angle, shooting on location, taking the audiences somewhere that they're going to see the trailer and say 'What is that? It's epic.'' Loading The Australia depicted is both familiar and unnervingly hyperreal. From The Surfer 's very first interactions with an Australian, where obscenities are barked in his face for no apparent reason, to constant harassment by a band of unruly teens, to the calm but threatening deployment of a 'Yeah but nah'. According to Lorcan, this was the work of screenwriter Thomas Martin, who has spent significant time working in Australia. But they also received a little bit of help from the locals. 'It was great to be surrounded by Australian talent while making the film – there's some osmosis that happens organically. We also dropped in some colloquialisms and vernacular that the actors or local surfers advised on.' In the film, we're shown a country where everyone's a prick, everyone's performing some kind of heightened interpretation of masculinity, there's a cultish devotion to the surf, and an unjustified ownership over a public beach. It's a heightened, funny, deliberately outrageous Australia, but not one that feels completely beyond the realms of possibility. James Colley travelled as a guest of Stan. Stan is owned by Nine, owner of this masthead.
The Age
23-05-2025
- Entertainment
- The Age
I was having a nice day at the beach. Then Nicolas Cage turned up
It's a postcard-perfect day. The sky is a cloudless blue, the sand is golden brown, waves crash on the beach in rhythm, as I stand on the water's edge and watch Hollywood superstar Nicolas Cage attempt to force-feed a rat to a drowning man. I'm on the set of The Surfer, a new film from Irish director Lorcan Finnegan, shot in Yallingup, Western Australia. I am here as an accidental plus-one. When I got the call to visit the set, no one knew Miranda Tapsell had joined the cast. Such is my commitment to this story, I'd made sure to marry her seven years earlier. Of course, I leapt at the opportunity. Who wouldn't want to sit in and see what your partner actually does all day? Especially when 'what they do' happens to include performing alongside one of your favourite actors of all time. From childhood viewings of Con Air, Face/Off and Gone in Sixty Seconds (all far too early), to irony-fuelled teen years with The Wicker Man, to pretentious uni days spent analysing Adaptation, and finally, adult admiration for Moonstruck and tender oddities like Pig – my Nicolas Cage fandom has been lifelong, chaotic, and evolving. Certain expectations come with any Nicolas Cage film, as any fan knows. You cannot always guarantee it will be good or even comprehensible, but you can be certain it will never be boring. A media storm has followed this production, breakfast news tracking every movement of Cage and his family across the country, including interviews on multiple networks with the owners of Busselton's Food Of Asia grocery store, who had the honour of selling kimchi, rice and oranges to Cage. While I'm on set, there's a quiet fascination with Cage — his methods, his choices, his presence. All the things that make him unmistakably The Cage. I'm told a story of Cage quietly reading the paper, only to notice three passing actors with whom he has a fight scene later in the day, and announce to them that they better prepare for an arse-kicking. The grown men giggle with delight. Despite the erratic nature of his character and the 'Rage Cage' moniker his back catalogue has picked up over the years, Finnegan says everything Cage does is very thoughtful and deliberate. In The Surfer, Cage plays the eponymous Surfer on a downward spiral as he attempts to buy back his childhood home and surf at his local beach. 'We had lots of conversations in prep before shooting and teased out everything,' Finnegan says. 'Nick had some dialogue tweaks, which we included in the script, so by the time we started shooting, he was incredibly prepared and never needed to look at the script again. He also tracked his character's physical changes, like his limp and his voice becoming hoarse.' The Surfer 's antagonist walks a line somewhere between sandcastle kicking beach bully and tech evangelist cult leader. Played by Australian actor Julian McMahon, he bounces off Cage in that kind of part-seductive tango, part death-spiral. 'You know what Nic is going to bring is a lot of energy, and a lot of dynamics and a lot of creativity to his piece because he always has and always does. I can't imagine him not,' McMahon said. 'I don't know if it's the influence of Nic's energy that I knew coming in was going to be present but I definitely felt like this character, there's a beauty in the quietness and simplicity of him a lot of the time, and that would work nicely with the energy that someone like Nic brings to the piece. You want to take them on a journey. You want to push that boundary. I've always found it interesting, when you play a bad guy, to see how much you can get people to love you.' While I arrive too late to witness my wife's scene with Cage, Ms Tapsell did agree to grant me an interview (on the proviso I refer to her as 'Ms Tapsell'). 'It was absolutely surreal working with Nic Cage. He called a lot of the shots on the set,' she says. 'There was no rehearsal, we just had to go for it. Luckily, I knew all my lines. But he was very patient, he was very kind.' At one point, as cameras and equipment were hastily moved around Tapsell, she had to raise her hand to ask what exactly was going on. 'This man elbowed me and it was Nic and he said 'So basically, I am going to go over there and I'm going to kick some ass' and I said to myself, yeah, this is it, this is why I said yes to the project in the first place. I am in Con Air. I am in Face/Off. It's going to be one of those things that stays with me forever.' The Surfer features a strong Australian cast, including Nicholas Cassim (The Correspondent, Mr Inbetween) and emerging talent Finn Little. At just 18, Little has already built an impressive resume, from his debut in Storm Boy (2019) to a role in the international series Yellowstone. His role as Cage's son was shot as he flew back and forth between his year 12 exams. 'It sounded like a good role. Come to Western Australia, do a bit of surfing, hang out with Nic Cage,' Finn says. Like many on set, Finn had a favourite Cage film he was happy to chat about during production – in his case, the recent hit The Unbearable Weight of Massive Talent. 'To take the piss out of yourself in a movie about yourself ... It was a good film.' Producer Robert Connolly, whose expansive filmmaking career includes Australian stories from Balibo to The Dry, says there are creative opportunities that come with bringing the outside eye into Australian cinema, noting that Wake In Fright was directed by Ted Kotcheff, a Canadian. Loading It's clear speaking with Lorcan that he is a great fan of Australian cinema. 'Lots of early Peter Weir films were an inspiration to me in general when I started filmmaking, like The Plumber, Picnic at Hanging Rock, and The Last Wave, as well as Colin Eggleston's film Long Weekend,' he says. 'Wake in Fright and Walkabout were also key inspirations – and examples of non-Australian directors making very Australian films – so we felt we could continue in that tradition with The Surfer.' The quest to find the perfect location for the film started in Kalbarri, a six-hour drive north of Perth, and weaved its way down the coast until Lorcan and his team arrived in Yallingup, a journey of over 800 kilometres. There, they found a location so perfect it was as if it had been conjured by the script itself, somehow both claustrophobic and expansive, beautiful and dangerous. Connolly puts it simply: 'This is a film called The Surfer and this is a world renowned surf beach.' The turbulent surf and perilous escarpment provided a challenge for filmmakers but Connolly was determined to stay out of the studio. 'I've always thought that the success of high-end streaming has thrown down the gauntlet to filmmakers to make films for the cinemas even better,' he says. 'Shooting that wide angle, shooting on location, taking the audiences somewhere that they're going to see the trailer and say 'What is that? It's epic.'' Loading The Australia depicted is both familiar and unnervingly hyperreal. From The Surfer 's very first interactions with an Australian, where obscenities are barked in his face for no apparent reason, to constant harassment by a band of unruly teens, to the calm but threatening deployment of a 'Yeah but nah'. According to Lorcan, this was the work of screenwriter Thomas Martin, who has spent significant time working in Australia. But they also received a little bit of help from the locals. 'It was great to be surrounded by Australian talent while making the film – there's some osmosis that happens organically. We also dropped in some colloquialisms and vernacular that the actors or local surfers advised on.' In the film, we're shown a country where everyone's a prick, everyone's performing some kind of heightened interpretation of masculinity, there's a cultish devotion to the surf, and an unjustified ownership over a public beach. It's a heightened, funny, deliberately outrageous Australia, but not one that feels completely beyond the realms of possibility. James Colley travelled as a guest of Stan. Stan is owned by Nine, owner of this masthead.
San Francisco Chronicle
22-05-2025
- Entertainment
- San Francisco Chronicle
Tension on ‘Madden' set as actor allegedly quits over racial slur and nude scene
A supporting actor cast in ' Madden,' the biopic of Bay Area football legend John Madden starring Nicolas Cage, has reportedly quit the production over the use of a racial epithet and objections to a nude scene. The unidentified actor was working with director David O. Russell on 'an impromptu monologue when the director allegedly said the N-word,' according to unnamed sources cited in a TMZ report posted Wednesday, May 21. The actor and others who witnessed the exchange are said to have walked off set. A day earlier, the same actor reportedly said he did not want to be in a locker room scene that required full frontal nudity, which allegedly angered Russell. Sources close to the studio, however, dispute the TMZ report, stating it was the actor's idea to include the derogatory language in the scene after a 'private creative conversation' with Russell. They maintain that the director did not use the slur on set. The sources also emphasized 'that nudity was not sprung on anyone — everyone knew well in advance parts would be on display.' They claim an intimacy coordinator tried to make the actor more comfortable and suggested different blocking, but he still had an issue so Russell agreed the actor didn't have to be in the shot. Studio sources told TMZ the actor could return to the production, and that 'conversations' are ongoing. This isn't the first time Russell has been at the center of on-set conflicts. During the filming of 'Three Kings' (1999), the Oscar-nominated filmmaker and star George Clooney had a physical confrontation, which Clooney later said was 'truly, without exception, the worst experience of my life.' He also had arguments with Lily Tomlin on the set of 'I Heart Huckabees' (2004), videos of which were leaked to YouTube, and made Amy Adams' life 'a living hell' during the filming of ' American Hustle ' (2013), according to a Salon article that Adams later confirmed. 'Madden' began filming in Atlanta two weeks ago with Cage as the former Oakland Raiders head coach and National Football League broadcaster, and Christian Bale as Raiders owner Al Davis. One person who is part of the shoot told TMZ that Cage and Bale, both method actors, have been 'portraying their characters with an intensity that doesn't end when the cameras stop rolling.'
West Australian
17-05-2025
- Entertainment
- West Australian
Reel Talk: The Surfer sees Nicolas Cage in his Ozploitation era
3 stars Starring: Nicolas Cage, Julian McMahon, Finn Little, Alex Bertrand Rated: MA15+ In Cinemas: Now Some actors transform for a role. Others transform the role itself, bending it in their image. Nicolas Cage has always been in the latter category, and this is certainly the case in The Surfer, the Hollywood superstar's psychological thriller that was shot in Yallingup. Cage calls it 'Nouveau shamanism', illustrated hilariously when he played a version of himself in the excellent 2022 comedy, The Unbearable Weight Of Massive Talent. But, whatever you call it, no one does it better than him. And by 'it' we're talking about playing characters that oscillate effortlessly between unnatural calm and mania, earnestness and frivolity. If you need an actor who can believably seem unhinged, yet, by the closing credits, salvage sanity from the brink of madness, Cage is your guy. Which is precisely why Irish director Lorcan Finnegan (who previously gave us the trippy 2019 film, Vivarium) had to have the Oscar-winner for The Surfer. Wearing its influences like a blistering sunburn, the movie channels the Ozploitation era of Australian filmmaking, which produced seminal works such as Ted Kotcheff's 1971 classic, Wake In Fright. Think blazing sun, austere cinematography and a nagging sense of unease that permeates everything. The plot follows Cage's unnamed character, who returns to his coastal home town after years working in the US, with a dream of surfing the beloved break of his childhood and purchasing the house he grew up in. There's just one problem — a gang of surfers, known as the Bay Boys, are viciously protective of said break. Led by Scally, a charismatic bloke who doubles as a masculinity guru (played to perfection by Julian McMahon), the Bay Boys' locals-only policy sees them view Cage as an interloper. Stubbornly refusing to leave the car park overlooking the beach until the finance on the house comes through, Cage is inexorably pulled into a conflict with the locals. Baked in the sun, his grip on reality loosens as his desire to build a new life starts to become a desperate and unhealthy obsession. Scally, meanwhile, is indoctrinating young surfers in a storyline that examines modern masculinity, with McMahon finely balancing the menace to ensure the audience is never really convinced he's an outright villain. Similarly, Cage's perspective often feels untrustworthy, and you're left with a sense this could all be in his head, which adds to the surreal nature of the film. In the end, this oddness occasionally overwhelms the drama, and, though Cage's commitment to the role is commendable, going Full Cage is an acquired taste. Finnegan leans into the weird in a way we don't often see anymore, but it's hard to escape the feeling a more straightforward approach might have yielded a stronger result.
