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Deeper into sci-fi
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July 2, 2009
By Christine Kearney
Nicolas Cage has battled terrorists, drug dealers, prisoners and even himself in a varied acting career, but in the film Knowing, he may have met his toughest adversary yet - Mother Nature.
Knowing opened on local screens yesterday and once again has the Oscar-winner saving humankind, this time in a role that straddles science fiction and fantasy.
For Cage, it marks a further step away from straightforward action in films like National Treasure that have become his best box-office bets.
Cage, 45, gained fame playing mostly romantic oddballs in low-budget films such as the suicidal alcoholic in 1995's brilliant Leaving Las Vegas, which won him the Oscar for best actor.
He then reshaped himself as an action hero in Face/Off, Con Air and others.
"Most people in Hollywood at that time saw me as a kind of eccentric and not necessarily a 'manly eccentric','' the actor said when talking about his shifting image.
Now he again spans genres with films that delve into fantasy and science fiction, but continue to play on his image as an action hero with his trademark streak of eccentricity.
Other coming film roles of his include a comic book hero in Kick-Ass, a sorcerer in The Sorcerer's Apprentice and a 14th-century knight in Season of the Witch.
In Knowing he plays a single father and astrophysics professor, John Koestler, who decodes a message that foretells disasters. It is up him to warn the planet.
The message is given to Koestler by his son, who goes on this journey with him. Koestler also clashes with his own father, a preacher, as the movie explores themes of fatherhood, spirituality and destiny.
Cage, who has two sons and been married three times, including to actress Patricia Arquette and singer Lisa Marie Presley, said the movie's themes had struck personal chords with him.
"I don't believe there are accidents. I think everything does happen and leads to something else,'' he said. "I do think there is cause and effect.''
His belief in predestination might make it seem that the nephew of Godfather director Francis Ford Coppola believes his family ties made him a sure bet to pursue a career in the arts. But Cage said that wasn't true.
"I think it is all predestined, but I also think if I was just me and I didn't come from the family I came from, I would still have gone into some sort of life of expression,'' he said.
In fact, he changed his famous last name early in his career to avoid people saying he had won roles only because of his uncle.
Despite his best efforts to reshape his image by working in various genres, his reputation as an eccentric - cemented by roles in films such as 1988's Vampire's Kiss in which his character devours a live cockroach - remains intact.
Cage said he had learned to live with that image and does not make it a big part of his life.
"It is a blessing and a curse. I am kind of born with it, and don't really know if I can do anything about it,'' he said.- Reuters
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