Travolta/Cage #36 - Basic/Sonny (with Robert Daniels)

This week on the podcast, we’re joined by film critic Robert Daniels (of 812filmreviews and a contributor to RogerEbert.com, NY Times, Vulture, and others) to break down an exceedingly strange double feature in our heroes’ oeuvre!

First up is Basic, the final film to date from John “Die Hard” McTiernan, which sees John Travolta return to the military-legal-thriller well after General’s Daughter. Here, he plays (no shit) Tom Hardy, a sardonic crooked DEA agent roped into a murder investigation of his former hard-ass CO (Samuel L. Jackson, spitting ‘motherfucker’s from beyond the grave). It’s a wild, ropey ride with more twists than a loaf of challah.

On the other side of the coin, we see what happens when Nicolas Cage ropes his actor friends into a warmed-over Tennessee Williams riff with his first (and only) director credit to date, the disastrous Sonny! James Franco pops up as a pouty gigolo-turned-army-vet returning home from the war to N’awlins and his brothel-madam mother (Brenda Blethyn), who just won’t stop trying to get him to turn tricks again. Also, Cage shows up in a lace cravat for five minutes and shouts at Franco while trying to both kill him and suck his dick. Le cinema!

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