Nicolas Cage at the Aero Theater!

On Sunday night, the Aero Theater in Santa Monica hosted an advanced screening of a new Nicolas Cage movie called Joe, with Cage and the director doing a Q&A after the show.

Joe is about a former convict (the titular Joe, played by NC, obvs), trying to make a quiet living with his tree poisoning business. He hires a young boy, Gary, who is looking for work to help support his family because his deadbeat dad is a deadbeat. They develop a father-son relationship, and Joe tries to help Gary make his life into a better one than he had.

I really enjoyed the movie. I loved the symbolism or whatever of Joe running a business whose purpose is to poison trees that no one wants so that good trees can be planted, and at the end, Gary working for the company that plants new trees. I do find myself somewhat disturbed by super rednecky, meth-y people, so the real people that were sprinkled in with the real actors throughout the movie kind of freaked me out. The man who played Gary's father was a real life bum who they found at a bus station, having just left the traveling circus. He actually died just a few weeks ago.

Also, I totally called that it was filmed in Texas halfway through the film, and lo and behold, it was filmed around Austin and Bastrop!

The Q&A portion was really good. Cage said that he was influenced to take this role due to the challenges in his real life over the past couple years. He talked about his former acting style, which he called western baroque, kabuki style, and how he wanted to now take roles where he didn't have to 'act', he could just 'be' in the part. He knew the character of Joe, he identified with him. He did really reign in his performance in this movie, imbuing Joe with a sense of seething anger held in by hard-honed restraint. He also formed a real relationship with Tye, the actor who played the kid Gary. It was palpable on film as it seemed like a very authentic relationship.

Someone asked Cage about how he juggles fame with acting, since he is now the focus of so many internet memes and videos and whatnot. He gave a very thoughtful answer about the nature of celebrity today. Actors in the past didn't have to deal with someone seeing them out and about, making mistakes, and having that instantly be worldwide news due to smartphones and Twitter and such. I can't imagine having to deal with that. The thought of everyone looking at me and taking pictures would be enough for me to never leave my home every again. I was impressed by how aware he was of the whole thing, and in how he dealt with the question. 

We also saw Sam Worthington on the way out of the theater. He looked exactly the way he does on screen except kind of tiny. Also, I saw Amy Yasbeck at Westfield Century City earlier in the day. Doesn't have anything to do with Nicolas Cage, I just thought it was worth mentioning! Celeb count = 3!