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Nicolas Cage is likely the perfect selection for a audacious horror film about Jesus Christ, but not for the reasons certain fans might assume. Truthfully, the star does not even portray the central religious figure in The Carpenter’s Son: his character is credited simply as The Carpenter. Cage is positioned as the Joseph of this narrative, striving to maintain his religious convictions as his son (acted by the young actor), their now-teenage adopted son, commences to show divine powers. The reason it’s difficult to picture another major actor taking this character is that while his character becomes weighed down with multiple trials, Cage himself seems almost touchingly certain that the murky, grim feature is worth his time.

Cage's Latest Career Choices

Nicolas Cage has spending his time more judiciously lately. He yet stars in more movies than the majority of regular audiences may ever watch — for instance, are you aware that the actor has filmed a trio of different frontier films in the past three years? — but he also includes prestige A24/Neon gigs for example Dream Scenario, another notable movie, and a further title. This new film seems like a similar project, in that it’s borderline horror, possibly controversial, and takes a campy-sounding description with gravity.

The Film's Premise and Direction

Regrettably, writer-director the director does not justify that serious attention. The Carpenter’s Son starts from a compellingly nomadic place, marketed as inspired by an unknown scripture concerning the youthful days of the messiah. Cage's character, The Mother, and their son move frequently, fearful of doctrinal intolerance or suspicion about their son's mysterious gifts. “Calamity follows us,” Cage mournfully notes. It goes on when evil influences attack the household at their new home, beginning on that traditional religious challenge for the son.

Sometimes, the movie echoes an Exorcist-style horror film, except that no one of the lead characters are explicitly taken over. Instead, they grow increasingly alienated from one another, as these forces influence a local young woman (the actress, credited as “The Stranger”) who the son forms a relationship with, and gives all disturbing images of a bleak destiny. The Carpenter in particular struggles with his position in the narrative, at times berating his child who mystifies him.

Controversy and Sensitivity

The content is prone to invite debate, and Nathan treats it with plenty of delicacy — too much, perhaps. The concept of a young man facing his eventual sacrifice and seduced by mysterious forces is truly frightening, but Nathan may be cautious about appearing sensational and anxious to signal his aims, so he often falls back on gloomily threatening filming. Characters brood incessantly — the singer-actress, who demonstrated real promise in a recent film update, surprisingly — yields her performance to her character's costume, sometimes broken up by a few disturbing frightening scenes.

Cage's Portrayal and Film's Shortcomings

Meanwhile, Cage dabbles in precisely the type of overacting that his more snickering appreciators may desire. One scene (also included) in promotional material in which Cage erupts and screams “My faith has been shattered!” When this sort of florid outburst is part of a Jesus-themed horror movie, maybe a more brazenly silly approach would be more effective of the actor's readiness to go over the top if needed. On the other hand, The Carpenter’s Son echoes the less successful straight-to-DVD movies he starred in over the last decade — excluding the campy action films so much as the serious stories and supernatural thrillers that typically appear interesting, and usually have a few choice actor's highlights, but ultimately feel like, frankly, low-budget DTV material.

Truthfully, some of those, though not as grand, were more watchable in general. Here is where I must disregard my usual practice, not faith-based but career-related: Years back, a respected mentor convinced me to eliminate descriptive terms like “tedious” or “uninteresting” from my reviewing language. These words convey little except a personal and generically described restlessness, withdrawing from the job of vividly conveying the mental and feeling of viewing an individual production. It's challenging to convey tedium without appearing dull personally. It's equally vague as calling a movie “engaging.” “Explain further,” that is.

Yet, I acknowledge, I grew weary throughout The Carpenter’s Son. In its defense, it is a devotional type of dullness, not due to The Carpenter’s Son is lecturing, but since it requires a sort of dutiful submission to watch it. After a while soon after starting, the movie locks into a cyclic tempo of simmering anguish, and never really