Face/Off (1997)

Director: John Woo

Cast: John Travolta, Nicolas Cage, Joan Allen, Gina Gershon

Have I Seen It Before: Never. I always suspected that there was a reason for that.

Did I Like It: The virtues of the film are encapsulated in its poster. Take two movie stars—and both Travolta and Cage were at the top of their star-power post Pulp Fiction (1994) and The Rock (1996)* and allow them to play both the virtuous (possibly to the point of insanity) hero and the scene-chewing villains. If only the Batman series could have offered Michael Keaton that same deal, he might never have hung up the cowl.

And then there’s two and a half hour beyond that pitch where you’ve got to fill. Perhaps the delineation between Sean Archer and Castor Troy isn’t all that well defined, ultimately. Both of the main characters seem to randomly find a moment or two in the course of day to have a complete emotional meltdown, and never quite for the reasons you might suspect. Or any reasons. At all.

This might be forgiven, if not completely ignored, if it weren’t for the fact that the action movie surrounding this conceit is a little pulse-less. It’s not even remotely as innovative as Woo’s efforts before being swallowed whole by Hollywood**. It’s not even the kind of guilty pleasure one might get from watching Michael Bay’s bloated music videos of the era. There are plenty of films that came to exist merely because it was a good business deal/ego-trip for the parties involved, but few that feel so obviously mired in that initial decision and no others.

*I am by no means equating these two films as a matter of quality, just in their collective ability to allow Cage and Travolta to make whatever film they wanted.

**We all—Woo included—could have enjoyed a lot less confusion over the next several years if he could have gone back to Hong Kong before Mission: Impossible II (2000).

Nixon (1995)

Director: Oliver Stone

Cast: Anthony Hopkins, Joan Allen, Mary Steenburgen, James Woods*

Have I Seen It Before: Oh, sure.

Did I Like It: First of all, the fact that David Hyde Pierce and Madeline Khan were in the same film together means it should be one of the all-time greats. I mean, it’s not a comedy, but still… That’s just science. The rest of the cast is pretty stacked, too. It’s one of those movies where as the opening credits unfurl, I’m more and more excited for the three hours that are to follow.

And the movie is pretty good. Hopkins gives a solid performance throughout, especially as his Welsh access can never be completely supplanted by the Nixonian growl, and his eyes are always a bit too manic** to fully recreate the Yorba Lindan’s scowl. He gives Nixon all of the tragedy he needs to sell a biopic about him, without ever fully forgiving him for his more baffling flaws.

And on the topic of baffling flaws, there are a few things that nag at this viewer. I don’t think I have ever been more pulled out of a film than when—at the height of the famous first debate of the 1960 Presidential election, John Kennedy is clearly depicted via archival footage… until suddenly he isn’t. Turning on a dime, JFK is suddenly played by an actor who isn’t even remotely doing a reasonable impression to match with the previous archival stuff. Where’s Vaughn Meader when you need him?

One more thing from the baffling department, but I actually kind of like this one. I can’t quite fathom why the Watergate burglars were watching what was clearly a Jam Handy instructional film during the movie’s opening scenes. It does obliquely introduce some of the themes with which we are about to reckon, but for the life of me I don’t understand why Howard Hunt and the rest were spending their down time doing this, but I’m oddly charmed that both this movie and the MST3K episode of Manos: The Hands of Fate (1966).

*In a recent review of John Carpenter’s Vampires (1998), mainly because James Woods starred it. This film was much easier to swallow, given that he’s playing one of history’s greatest dickheads.

**One might be tempted to think too much of Lecter, but I also can’t not look at him and see Don Diego de la Vega.