REVIEW #175 The Unbearable Weight of Massive Talent (2022)

The Unbearable Weight of Massive Talent sees Nicholas Cage play a heightened version of himself. With his career in decline, he is forced to take an appearance gig for a wealthy Spanish businessman, but he soon finds himself caught up in a CIA scheme to take down a powerful arms dealer.

Nicholas Cage and Pedro Pascal is the bromance I never knew I needed! The two of them worked incredibly well together, delivering some of the best on screen chemistry I’ve seen so far this year. For me, the best parts of the film were when it was just the pair of them together, the humour landed every time and they made an incredibly silly storyline so enjoyable. The irony is that the central protagonists virtually tell you what the worst part of the film will be… the finale action sequence that ruins a story about friendship in order to create a Hollywood blockbuster. They tell the audience this whilst creating their own script, then go on to lead us into exactly that and that adds fuel to the fire for this hilarious comedy. The film has such beautiful organic visuals, supposedly set in Mallorca, but filmed in Croatia, the stunning ocean side compound creates some incredible cinematic shots that are very easy on the eye. My question marks for the film arise from the casting choices of Tiffany Haddish and Ike Barinholtz as the CIA agents, both hilarious actors but I think if you had more serious performers in the role it would have actually created more humour out of such a silly situation. Elements of this film feel incredibly authentic and realistic, it’s almost like the real events of Nic’s life merged with the script in which the two protagonists were working on and thus created a comedy hybrid that’s easily digestible for audiences. I’m so happy Nicholas Cage returned to comedy because he is hilarious and as I mentioned at the start of the review, the combination of him and Pedro Pascal is a winning formula that I would LOVE to see again. The third act does get a little ridiculous but it’s clear that was intentional by the director, playing on the irony of the storyline to create humour and I guess that worked because the final act was still funny even if it wasn’t up to the same standard as the first and second act. So overall I would highly recommend The Unbearable Weight of Massive talent, it’s an easy watch that will have you laughing throughout, thoroughly enjoyable.

8.5/10

Thanks for reading

Callan