Prisoners of the Ghostland (2021)

I ended up walking out of this movie. I'm a big fan of Cage's gonzo approach to films, and appreciate the whacky, nonconformist nature of his work. While many of his movies skate on that artistic edge of absurd/genius, this one just kinda sucked. Felt contrived to the point that it was unwatchable.

Fmovies: I'm going to start off looking at the 10 star reviews. I just don't understand how anyone could be so positive about this movie. I felt like I was in a Redlettermedia's "Best of the Worst". Never have I laughed so much and so hard at parts of a film that I did not think were intentionally funny. Never have I ever face palmed so many times or had to stop a movie due to pure confusion. Not confusion due to complexity or something like that but due to wondering "why" as in why did the filmmaker chose any of this? This film is astonishingly absurd and not in a good way.

There was one scene that just screamed Mandy and low and behold this film is from the makers of Mandy. I did not like Mandy, Pig, tolerated Willie's Wonderland and skipped Color Out of Space. I'm coming to the conclusion that I just don't like Cage or his acting anymore. I don't really blame him though. The Rock, Con Air and Face Off will always be classics to me but this is pure grade A nonsense. I never put spoilers in my reviews but for this film I just have to mention something that happens in the begin that really doesn't spoil anything but if you are adverse this is your spoiler alert. Cage is given a car to go on his timed quest. He gets out of the car and takes a beat-up bike and everyone thinks he is so cool. At this point I thought the film was going to be intentionally funny and self aware. Nope, he gets about a hundred feet and is stopped by someone who throws him the keys to the same car. He than drives the car...What!? I am still so baffled.

Anyways this is getting too long so if you like films that focus on Asian culture, Cage, decent scenery and camera work you might enjoy this more than me but I think I'm being way too generous giving this a 4. I laughed so much. I just, I just don't understand. Why? Why to everything.

This movie is one of the worst movie that I have seen this year. It is considered as an action movie yet it has no action scenes.

Prisoners of the Ghostland fmovies. This is a gem of false advertising, because this is NOT action movie and even not a good example of imaginative out of boundaries festival cinema. This is epic some how, yes - EPIC FAIL. Actually this film is just small production artsy-fartsy wonnabe retro-otaku-western-art-hause made like in TWO locations around one junkyard. Cage even didn't try to ply he just SHOUT his replics and one time even on japanese even he straight up all time along speaks only english. Why? Even Sono don't know, this is just a mess. Plot here thin as air and don't make any sense in very baaad means. Its not a smart movie, not a great picture from someone who have peculiar fantasies. Its japanese routine for western people: here your Hiroshima complex, there your white dude ball and big sausage (why its EVEN in movie its not fun just stupid how Sono was obsessive about Cage balls). This is bad film from all angles.

Without any doubts; Nic Cage and Sofia Boutella could not fail. Well it fails awfully. Please pay attention; I am not drunk There is a mix of Western, Kabuki theater, Mad Max (?) and the movie itself looks like old Roman Theater with chorus, and signs explaining history. There is also some kind of Ghost in the middle.

Nothing really makes any sense; stages have a naïve style like in 60s movies, acting is unbearable (Cage seems to be fooling around). The rest are cartoonish.

Sofia Boutella tries but it is impossible for her to save this mess.

If you see the comedy "The Play that went wrong" well is basically the same but without any comedy intent.

Sion Sono has made some interesting movies in his country Japan and perhaps this have some kind of cultural meaning; but in America is just shamefully absurd for everybody including the viewers.

Do not lose your time unless you have to see it to believe it.

Nicolas Cage. Seems like that's all it takes to garner instant interest in a film, as the actor has achieved living legend status in the eyes of many genre fans (and for good reason). In his latest, Prisoners of the Ghostland, Cage plays Hero, a ruthless, imprisoned bank robber set free by a wealthy warlord known as The Governor (Bill Moseley, even more to get excited about), and tasked with finding The Governor's kidnapped "granddaughter", Bernice (Sofia Boutella, always exciting, in more ways than one). Taking place in the post-apocalyptic Samurai Town, Cage's Hero is strapped in a leather suit set to self-destruct in 5 days, including detonators located in the vicinity of each testicle (testicuule, The Governor pronounces it), and encounters gunslingers, ghosts, samurai, and a crazed cult. The film puts Cage in an Escape From New York meets Big Trouble in Little China scenario, and the end result is a movie just as wild as you would imagine, an enormously entertaining adrenaline rush that brings the Cage Rage.

Once the film is set up and our Hero is on his journey, the film has plenty of unexpected laughs and is very funny at times. It almost works as a spoof of the Western, action genre. "What a badass," "he's so cool," say a couple of awestruck onlookers as Hero chooses a dainty bicycle with a basket instead of the black sports car when he leaves on his journey. He does eventually end up with he car because, tick tock, the clock is ticking on that deadly leather jumpsuit.

While looking for Bernice, Hero is lead to a torched, windswept landscape with crumbling mannequins swaying back and forth, cracked and broken shells that conceal prisoners inside of them. Every turn in this world holds a different danger, a threat to end Hero's life at any moment. And all of this is handled with such confidence by director Sion Sono, creating a thrilling and playful and insane world of filthy neon. Imagine Mad Max as a supernatural Samurai Western.

In the middle of all this madness is Nicolas Cage, wonderfully off the wall and right at home in such a place. It feels as though the film was inspired by Cage's reputation playing odd characters, giving the film a match-made-in-heaven quality. If Cage gives Prisoners of the Ghostland it's unlikely (anti) hero, it's Sofia Boutella as Bernice who gives the movie its glimmer of hope. It's Bernice we root for as she's the possibility for a brighter future in the Ghostland. What an exquisite performance from Boutella alongside the scene stealing Cage.

There's a religious-like fixation on time in the Ghostland. The inhabitants hold the giant clock displayed on the bones-like structure of an old capital building at 8:14, fearing if it hits 8:15 the atomic blasts will once again wreak havoc. The people who live under The Governor refer to him as a clock, as time itself. In the Ghostland, everyone is a prisoner to a forgotten existence, to a lifestyle lost. Time has vanished for the prisoners of the Ghostland, only recognizable in the form of their rulers. This fixation with time really pushes Hero's race against the clock to the forefront, as well as any hope the future of the Ghostland has left.

Prisoners of the Ghostland presents a unique vision from filmmaker Sion Sono ( it would make for a great double feature with Ana Lily Amirpour's The Bad Batch). A bloody, dirty, balls to the wall, gorgeous looking blast of color, chaos, and redemption in a land of hopelessness. Nicolas Cage