From Raising Arizona to Vampire’s Kiss, and Adaptation to The Unbearable Weight of Massive Talent, Nicolas Cage has embraced the unusual if a role requires it. If you look at the best Nic Cage movies, you are going to find performances that push the envelope in search of uncomfortable truths. We managed to see one of those films when attending the Toronto International Film Festival, and now that the upcoming Dream Scenario has dropped its trailer, you can press play on the below clip and sink into the lunacy that Cage and director Kristoffer Borgli have cooked up.
As you can tell, Dream Scenario has an incredibly original pitch. Cage plays Paul Matthews, an invisible father, husband and college professor who stumbles through life unannounced and is basically considered insignificant by everyone in his immediate circle. Until Paul starts to discover that people are dreaming about him. And not just one or two people. Everybody is seeing Paul in their dreams, for reasons that the movie protects until necessary.
And Paul really loves it.
As I wrote following my screening at the Toronto International FIlm Festival, I think that Dream Scenario features one of the best performances of Nicolas Cage’s career. And I wasn’t alone in feeling that way. Critical praise flowed in for Dream Scenario, with many commending the difficult task that Kristoffer Borgli assumed in finding the right tone for a surrealist comedy. Because as funny as it first seems that Paul is appearing in people’s dreams – and the things that he is doing in the dreams – the situation has the tendency to turn into a nightmare.
For a few years now, Nicolas Cage has been riffing on the legacy of Cage. Especially in The Unbearable Weight of Massive Talent, he was playing an exaggerated version of his own reality, acknowledging the larger-than-life myth that he has become thanks to spectacular performances in films like Adaptation, Leaving Las Vegas (for which he won his Oscar), Face/Off, and Pig. In Dream Scenario, however, Cage once again loses himself completely in a part, masking the tricks that usually characterize his performance and giving himself over completely to the vision of an exciting storyteller. Dream Scenario is a huge win.
The latest Nicolas Cage movie will be in theaters beginning on November 10, so keep it on your radar. It’s one of the many upcoming 2023 movies that we know you will want to see.