Beaten beaten lucky – Weekend
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The thriller “Fight with the Devil” was released in Russia, which owes its original name to The Rolling Stones’ hit “Sympathy For The Devil”. True, there will be no real rock and roll in the frame – for nothing that Nicolas Cage brandishes a gun here and lures with red hair.
Las Vegas. Leaving his son with his grandmother, David Chamberlain (Yuel Kinnaman) is in a hurry to give birth to his wife. After the death of the first-born, the family treats the new life with special trepidation – and the almost two-time father does not want to miss such a crucial moment. However, he will have to: right in the hospital parking lot, a stranger (Nicolas Cage) flops into the back seat of his tarantass, broadcasting a threat with his whole appearance. A burgundy jacket in a snakeskin pattern, messy red-dyed hair, a gun in his hand, finally. The man is sure that he and David are familiar and they have old scores. More precisely – with a mysterious boss who is impatiently waiting for a meeting somewhere halfway to Boston. What will Chamberlain say?
“Fight with the Devil” is the debut screenplay by Luke Paradise, which, unfortunately, has all the shortcomings of the debut screenplay. Chamberlain’s painstakingly articulated background, meaningful beginnings in the scenery of the city of temptations, the impenetrable “red man”, numerous winks that lead nowhere. Kind of like the “witch hour” statement (from three to four after midnight), when the driver and passenger turn into a seedy diner, where they will have a snack for the climax. Of all the few options – on the eve of Chamberlain’s second fatherhood, the past overtakes, doubts about the future, or otherworldly temptations – the screenwriter chooses the most unpretentious. Although Nicolas Cage plays in the trademark “shamanic” manner of a leprechaun who has gone crazy in the era of services and consumption. “Fight with the Devil” rushes past all the possibilities at high speed, offering viewers only a sympathetic wave to the myths of Las Vegas.
Only the final point of the route can be considered a semblance of intrigue: will everything turn into a kunshtuk in the spirit of Cronenberg’s “Justified Cruelty” or will it leave the illuminated area on the territory of “Highway to Nowhere” or “Wild at Heart”. If Cage’s character is responsible for lengthy monologues and throwing dust in the eyes, then Kinnaman ruins the entire game for the authors right off the bat. It’s hard to believe that the almost two-meter action hero (“Robocop”, “Suicide Squad”, “Altered Carbon”) is actually a frightened layman who is mistakenly taken somewhere to hellish hell. And even a symbolic loss of points, signaling a partial unlocking of hidden brutality, does not have the same effect as in Sam Peckinpah’s conditional Straw Dogs, where Dustin Hoffman’s fury was awakened.
It is all the more surprising to watch the acting duel of Kinnaman and Cage – ice and fire – in a 90-minute film school sketch. Probably not the last role here was played by the Israeli director Yuval Adler, with whom Kinnaman had already worked on the Hollywood debut of The Secrets We Keep. Well, Cage could be tempted by red hair or the ability to pay at least some of the huge debts. It is the director, who previously shot about the Palestinian-Israeli conflict (Bethlehem) and Mossad (The Messenger), who saves this film from complete disaster, maintaining the weakening suspense and not allowing Cage to go to the benefit performance. True, the aura of his past works makes one fantasize that “Fight with the Devil” would look incomparably sharper on less abstract Israeli material. And leaving Las Vegas in the company of two unfortunate men with a dark past is an almost mundane route. Pass ahead for the fare.
In theaters from July 20
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