It ’s hard to determine who ’s the worse scoundrel : John Travolta or Nicolas Cage . And that ’s exactly why Face / Off is the perfect mid-90s action thriller . Who do you settle down for ? Unclear because the principal character switched faces , and it ’s heavy to tell who the safe hombre is . The impression is elate .
look / Off is a John Woo - directed mush legal action thriller , a movie about a psychotic criminal and a too - committed cop : Cage and Travolta , respectively . Cage plays ruthless condemnable Castor Troy , and Travolta diddle heroic FBI factor Sean Archer . At least , until they switch fount .
Cage has killed Travolta ’s son . Then , Travolta flush it to kill Cage , but do to get a grimace transplant so that he can assume Cage ’s identity . And then , John Milton Cage Jr. wakes up from a coma , draw a medico to transpose Travolta ’s face on his head , and move into Travolta ’s house to fuck things up . This is apparently a complicated situation . Travolta goes to jail and gets his ass give up a bunch . Cage ’s nerdy brother has all form of trouble figuring out who to trust . And Travolta ’s married woman is put in a terribly ill-chosen situation , since she consider that this man with her husband ’s face is her husband when he ’s really her husband ’s worst enemy . It ’s a real wild drive .
The first time I saw Face / Off , I was a stupefied teenager , so the canonic plot points were enough to occupy my brain . The movie seemed exciting and unspeakably weird , ground on the fact that Travolta and Cage shift faces less than an hr into it . But in retrospect , Face / Off is a picture that sum up up an era . America was optimistic about technology and in the thick of a short - lived peacetime . Writers had to get extra creative about activeness movies . ( Remember , this was the era of Demolition Man . )
What I did n’t realize in 1997 , when the motion-picture show hit theaters , was the extent to which the face swap and the framing of act of terrorism was weirdly prescient . Two decennary ago , Hollywood imagined terrorism as an open - ended plot engine , a ready to hand way to name characters as scoundrel and take root a patch in a smarmy goo of this - would - never - really - go on . ( Picture the seemingly out of the question plots of Con Air or The Rock for some Nic coop - fueled acknowledgment points . ) Making a movie ’s bomber swap confront with the baddie seemed like a wacky gimmick , but movies were brimming with silly gimmicks back then .
But the world is different now . Face transplantsare a real matter . The lurking threat of terrorism is a material matter . It ’s still pretty implausible that the FBI would put a criminal ’s cheek onto an federal agent to pass through a ring of domestic terrorist . The notion that remorseless killers be treble lives that have the capacity to blow up entire citiesis just fanciful . This is a substantial thing , too .
All that said , Face / Off is still a chill to watch . Not only did it make me feel nostalgic for the calm of the mid-90s ; it also made me consider how far we ’ve come since then , in sound ways and bad . I like that Face / Off leave you guessing . fount transplants are crazy , but are they also scary ? ( soupcon : no . ) act of terrorism is definitely scarey , but is it also ridiculous to call back that some some psychopath would point Los Angeles ? ( Hint : no . ) It ’s refreshful to watch a cheesy military action pic that seems somehow self - aware , even in its utter absurdity . It ’s also startling to realize that Face / Off might not be as absurd as it once was .
intimately 20 class afterwards — and seen with a more experienced set of eye — the Nic Cage masterpiece is even more exhilarating than it was the first clock time I saw it . Watching Face / Off feels like dusting off a treasured vintage , twisting in the corkscrew , and popping the bottle . Even if it tastes like vinegar , the whole experience is a clap .
You should watch Face / Off again . Consider what offense seemed like in the mid- to late-90s and laugh at the bonkers idea of a criminal and a cop trading faces . It ’s especially fun , because our reality is spoiled .
Sure , it ’s amazing that face transplant exist . They ’re also a transformative development . But the idea of a Nic Cage — a spliff - smoke , tight - talking , womanizing son of a bitch — seems rather quaint compared to the real threat of ball-shaped terrorism . When the truth is scarey than fable , escaping into the odorous embracement of a mid-90s legal action thriller like Face / Off is n’t a bad way to detach from reality for a few hours .
Daily Newsletter
Get the best tech , scientific discipline , and acculturation news in your inbox day by day .
News from the future tense , delivered to your present tense .
