Everything Wrong With Con Air

Twenty-two years after its release (yes, really!) Con Air is still a thunderously enjoyable empty-headed action flick. Nicolas Cage in action movies was still a novelty back in 1997, he wasn’t in trouble with the IRS, and he was riding high off the back of being a newly minted Oscar winner.

Con Air was the middle act of an action trilogy masterpiece from Cage, The Rock came before, and a couple of months after Con Air, Face/Off hit cinemas with a vengeance. Cage would go on to make more summer movies for producer Jerry Bruckheimer, but nothing compared to the sheer outlandish fun of Con Air. A perfect film by no means, it’s the type of summer releases we don’t get much these days, violent, overblown, big dumb fun. Fast and Furious is two of those things, but they haven’t aged as well as Con Air.

Cage’s hair extensions might be a crime, but it’s not the worst sin Con Air is guilty of, but those clever folks at Cinema Sins have handily complied everything wrong with Con Air into on easy to watch video. Regardless of the plethora of sins on offer in Simon West’s 1997 action extravaganza, Con Air is still an awesome movie. I miss the days when Cage was a bankable actor, he might turn in a batshit crazy turn in something as inventive as Mandy every few years, but his recent choices give John Travolta a run for his money in the deeply questionable department.

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