In Dog Eat Dog, Cage brings back the edge, starring alongside superstar Willem Dafoe. Cage is Troy and Dafoe is Mad Dog. Their characters are racist, but they have a dark skinned partner named Diesel. He didn't make it onto the movie poster. Together they make a trio of drugged-out, sleazy ex-cons, ripping off other criminals. You might presume they're the worst of the worst.
You might also think with all the drugs, they'd be a little paranoid, especially Mad Dog, a reputable loose cannon. Troy is the smart, theoretical one, longing for someone to share his interests that are not drugs and crime. Diesel is the brooding hard ass, the cool one. It sounds like a fun life they have, doing a job and then partying until the next one. After all, they have a boss who finds them work. But let's face it, this motley crew isn't really the type to do every type of job. And what if they take an impossible to resist job which they are sure to fail?
Cage does some good acting in this film, and I'm not sure what it is that made him try so hard. Maybe he had some good directing. He even says one of my favorite phrases, "I heard that." Dafoe is, of course, amazing. In fact, all the acting is pretty all right.
With Dog Eat Dog, we are pitched with a heist-style story, with the odds low and the stakes high, all spelled out for the viewers. The thing about this trio of heroes, is we get a chance to sympathize with at least one of them enough to hope for their success. With such an obvious set-up, this film does more than surprise. Even I took a few shocks and felt some sad, not in the obvious "isn't your mind blown???" sense of many Cage films. Among the darkness and gun violence, I found this film to be fairly satisfying.
- Raising Arizona
- Leaving Las Vegas
- Red Rock West
- Adaptation
- Birdy
- Wild at Heart
- Dog Eat Dog
- Color Out of Space
- Peggy Sue Got Married
- City of Angels
- Bangkok Dangerous
- Drive Angry
- Lord of War
- Gone in 60 Seconds
- Matchstick Men
- Vampire's Kiss
- Con Air
- Face/Off
- Honeymoon in Vegas
- Amos and Andrew
- The Sorcerer's Apprentice
- Bringing Out the Dead
- The Family Man
- It Could Happen to You
- 8mm
- Ghost Rider
- Next
- The Weather Man
- 211
- The Croods
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