Bad Lieutenant : Escale à la Nouvelle-Orléans

Excellent movie which could have gone so horribly bad, in the wrong hands. Brilliant direction from Herzog, and skillfully let's Nick Cage, loose in his character (only previously seen in 'Face Off') and in exactly the same way Keitel, was used in the original (Abel Ferrara) 'Bad Lieutenant' film. Thankfully though 'Port of Call' has a completely different story and enough fresh ideas to make it a very worthy companion piece. This one turned out way, way better than expected.

This is a great movie that showcases nick cage at his finest. He is a great comedic actor and when the situation is right hits it out of the park!! Unfortunately lately hits severe hit and mostly miss. He takes on 2 many roles to dedicate himself to playing a role better. This movie shows the genre he is perfect at!!! Also great supporting cast as well. As far as comparisons I actually like this version much better than the original.

This movie is filled with humor and turns, it's jazzy and entertaining but not that similar to Abel Ferrara's 1992 story, in spite of the title. It features a wonderful and very much involved performance from Nicholas Cage, a lot of very black humor and gets to develop a strong pessimism. The story is appropriately set in New Orleans (during the Hurricane Katrina's aftermath) and mainly shows what occurs to good people when bad people prosper. Nicholas Cage aside, Val Kilmer doesn't probably manages to do much, but Mendes and Dourif deliver convincing performances. Abel Ferrara's "Bad Lieutenant" was a dirty depiction of a strongly damaged detective (played by Harvey Keitel), where, leaving from the illusions of a drug-induced cop, ended up involving a lot of Catholic guilt. Here there's more action and humor than that stuff, not that the movie is shallow but probably it's just a bit more unpretentious.

One thing you can always count on when you go into a Werner Herzog movie is that you can always expect to find a story surrounding a very bizarre individual. With Bad Lieutenant, I saw both Herzog and Nicholas Cage in a new light, or rather a new darkness. Labeled as a black comedy, there should be more emphasis on 'black' than on 'comedy'. The film bears a strong resemblance to the thematically surreal and contrived nature of a Coen Brothers film, but the difference is that this one is more character driven than plot driven. More specifically, this is a film that lives on one performance. Nicholas Cage for the first time in a while has done something worthy of recognition, possibly even award worthy.

He plays New Orleans cop Terence McDonagh, recently promoted to Lieutenant. The film follows his latest homicide investigation. Due to a back problem and a drug addiction he is grumpy and unstable. He is sort of an anti- American hero, and the film concludes on a very bizarre note but clever anti- conventional/Hollywood manner.

Though not Herzog's best, it is certainly one worth watching. With each film I see from him, past or present he continues to intrigue me, but I think in this case, it might be Nicholas Cage who deserves the most credit.

Nic Cage is a living, breathing cartoon character, both as a person and as an actor, and the best filmmakers seem to grasp intuitively that the best way to have Nic in a movie--the only way, really--is to first be sure they've got for him an appropriately comical, ironic, melodramatic or surreal story. This one happens to be all four, to a serious degree. It also features compelling and offbeat relationships and unexpected, wild action, all of it slyly hypnotic and even gripping.

It'd be fair to describe this film as a tense crime drama that's regularly relieved by comical gags if it weren't for the fact that the perfectly timed humorous beats are so damn hysterical--and so weird. The outrageously absurd, profoundly wacky moments so thoroughly overwhelm the more somber, dark and disturbing moments--not in quantity but in sublime intensity--that they thoroughly dislodge us from any dependable emotional or psychological perch and it's hard to know with any confidence from instant to instant what we're expected to feel or think, which, apparently, is very much intentional. We're being toyed with, and not coyly but blatantly, maybe even wickedly.

The director, Werner Herzog, is a connoisseur of contradiction and paradox as he's masterfully demonstrated in many of his films, such as the bleakly absurd "Aguirre, the Wrath of God," or the incredibly preposterous "Fitzcarraldo," or the often delightfully campy "Nosferatu the Vampyre" where subtle humor is so effectively collided against genuinely poignant drama. But this one's on a whole different level, and it's entirely the fault of Nic Cage and his nearly demented, turbocharged performance as an increasingly crazed, spiraling out of control, drug addicted crooked cop.

As his character's condition deteriorates and his affliction and corruption possess him to the core not only does Nic begin to distort his appearance and posture to match his deepening pathology but his voice as well becomes increasingly warped as it grows more high pitched and nasal, as though the mounting stress is compressing him like a squeeze toy. It's beyond silly but it somehow works, at least on the level of his character's distorted, perverted perspective.

Often the soundtrack is emphatically offbeat, quirky and disruptive, working in counterpoint to the pace and tone of the unfolding action. But the musical score might then quickly shift to more traditional rhythms more in sync with the apparent mood of the scene, which only renders those moments all the more unsettling. It's a very subversive technique inciting a creeping, crawling uncertainty deep within the subconscious, at a primal level; a sincerely surreal experience punctuated so ridiculously, so blatantly by the hallucinogenic appearances of those damn freaky iguanas. So freaky...

It's disorienting--in the best way--to be so constantly jerked, jolted and yanked around by a movie, especially when it's all being done so well, so confidently. Werner Herzog has crafted a sincerely bizarre, wild ride; a rare and special cinematic experience that will appeal to--and thrill--aficionados of superior, if idiosyncratic storytelling. Very much recommended above all else for its uniquely unorthodox, unhinged vibe.