The Unbearable Weight Of Massive Talent Review: 7 Ups & 3 Downs
5. Nic Cage's Delightfully Self-Deprecating Performance
Nic Cage certainly holds nothing back while playing a somewhat-fictional version of himself, who serves as a giddy satire of self-important, pretentious actors who always desire to be the center of attention.
Again, the film makes light of Cage's well-publicised debt issues and the decline of his once-fruitful blockbuster career, yet to Cage's credit he manages to bring some genuine melancholy and pathos to what is as much a character study as it is an action-comedy.
There's never any doubt that Cage isn't committing 100% to the part rather than simply leaning on the wacky meta angle - his take on Nic Cage feels at once a believable extension of himself and something exaggerated.
If there was somehow any lingering doubt that Cage isn't in on the joke re: his status as a meme God, Massive Talent should send it all up in smoke.