Rage Blu-ray Movie

Rating summary

Movie		3.0
Video		4.5
Audio		4.0
Extras		2.0
Overall		3.5

Rage Blu-ray Movie Review

The Past Is Not Past

Reviewed by Michael Reuben July 31, 2014

The trailer for Rage (also known as "Tokarev") makes it look like a low-rent variant of Taken, but it isn't. The desperate father played by Nicolas Cage in this Image Entertainment co-production is nothing like the ex-CIA superman created by Liam Neeson in the surprise 2008 hit. There is another recent character similar to Cage's, but identifying him would constitute a spoiler.

Rage was poorly received during its brief distribution through video on demand, but I wonder whether critics would have been kinder to a star other than Cage, who has reached a point in his career where he can't do anything right. After so many bombs and stinkers, plus some well-publicized financial troubles, Cage labors under the assumption that every performance is phoned in for money. One reviewer of Rage even accused Cage of approaching Steven Seagal territory—which is, of course, ridiculous. Standing still and doing nothing, Cage would still be more interesting onscreen than Seagal emoting with every muscle and jowl.

Rage is indeed low-rent territory for Cage, but precisely because he's working with a B-movie script and without a huge budget or elaborate effects, he has nothing to fall back on. Nor does he try to spice up his role with typical Nic Cage mannerisms (the twitching eyebrows, the hands held to the head) that wouldn't fit the character or the story. Instead, Cage delivers a straightforward performance in a story that turns out not to have much depth or nuance, and the result is to enhance the entire affair with the shimmer of movie star charisma. If Cage were to make another three or four medium-budget, workman-like films in this style, he and audiences might have a chance to rediscover each other.

Cage plays Paul Maguire, a family man with a successful construction business in an unidentified city. (The film was shot in Mobile, Alabama, but the deleted scenes indicate that the story was originally set in New Jersey.) In his youth, though, Paul was a hell-raising criminal, part of an Irish mob run by Francis O'Connell (Peter Stormare). When his daughter, Caitlin (Aubrey Peeples), was just a baby, Paul changed his life, after a bloody and vicious war between O'Connell's mob and a Russian crime syndicate run by O'Connell's arch-rival, Chernov (Pasha D. Lychnikoff). Later, Paul remarried, and although both his daughter and his second wife, Vanessa (Rachel Nichols), know about his past—as do the local police, in the person of Det. Peter St. John (Danny Glover)—everyone lets the past stay buried. Paul is now a respected citizen who stands shoulder-to-shoulder with the mayor at groundbreaking ceremonies. His daughter is a top student whom he hopes to send to Princeton.

Then one night, when Paul and Vanessa are out to dinner with movers and shakers, their lives are turned upside down. Det. St. John arrives with the news that Caitlin has been kidnapped from their home by three armed gunmen. They were after Caitlin specifically, because they left behind the two schoolmates with whom she was studying, Evan (Jack Falahee) and Mike (Max Fowler), who has a crush on Caitlin but was powerless to defend her. The grizzled detective asks Paul who would want to target his family, and Paul has no answer. He begins thinking about his old life. Then, with the help of two former running buddies, Kane (Max Ryan) and Danny (Michael McGrady), Paul does more than think. Long known to be handy with a knife, he puts on his former habits as easily as putting on a leather jacket, and goes looking for his daughter and her kidnappers.

Paul Maguire's journey into his past has a surreal quality, and not just because everyone, on both sides of the law, keeps warning him to cease and desist. Early on, Kane and Danny assure Paul that whoever took Caitlin is already dead; they just don't know it yet. But throughout Paul's long search, it feels as if he's already reached a destination that he doesn't yet recognize. Paul cannot escape the suspicion that Caitlin's abduction is some form of payback for an act he committed fifteen years ago while part of O'Connell's mob, an act that Paul thought had remained a secret. Who knows about it, how did they find out, and why have they waited until now to take their revenge? And why can't Paul and his buddies find them, no matter how many doors they break down or Russian hangouts they invade? (For reasons best left for the viewer to discover, Paul is convinced that the kidnappers are Russians associated with Chernov and his crew.)

Working from a script by Jim Agnew and Sean Keller (who co-wrote Dario Argento's Giallo), Spanish director Paco Cabezas makes his English-language debut on a modest scale, with action sequences that are only mild exaggerations and represent a welcome swing back in the direction of naturalism after too many indulgences in wire work and John Woo-style ballets of violence. If, in the end, neither the script nor the direction is capable of fully exploring the theme of past sins returning that Paul Maguire's story suggests, at the very least we have the haunted expression that Cage gives Paul, as the truth gradually dawns on him and he grasps the full measure of his own responsibility for everything that has happened to him and his family.

Rage Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

Rage was shot by Andrzej Sekula, the Polish cinematographer best known for his work on Reservoir Dogs and Pulp Fiction, but Sekula's digital photography for Rage (photographed on a Red One camera) is in an entirely different register than his stylized film textures for Quentin Tarantino. Rage begins with the flat, prosaic surfaces of a normal suburban life, then gradually darkens and shifts its palette into something more dangerous and threatening. Still, here as in its action scenes, Rage never departs from reality. When Sekula saturates the frame with red, it's because Paul Maguire has cornered a potential lead in a strip bar. Familiar action tricks like slow-motion are used sparingly, when they'll be most effective. (The conclusion of a chase scene on a watery rooftop is a good example.)

Image Entertainment's 1080p, AVC-encoded Blu-ray, which was presumably sourced from digital files, provides a sharp and detailed image, with excellent fine detail, good black levels and contrast, and a color palette that remains naturalistic except for specific scenes where a dramatic shift in color can be justified (e.g., the strip bar noted above). The image lacks a sense of depth, but this is consistent with the original photography and appears to represent a deliberate effort by the director and cinematographer to make Maguire and his former criminal associates look smaller than life rather than larger.

Image continues to prefer BD-25s, but at 98 minutes and with minimal extras, Rage does not suffer from compression issues. The average bitrate is 21.98 Mbps, which is adequate for a digitally acquired project with letterbox bars.

Rage Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

Rage's 5.1 sound mix, encoded in lossless DTS-HD MA 5.1, provides aggressive involvement for the film's action scenes, especially a demolition derby car-and-motorcycle pursuit in the film's third act. Also effective are the flashbacks to Paul Maguire's violent youth, which intrude into the present in loud, jagged fragments, as if erupting into Paul's consciousness from some buried place. Several indoor scenes of gunfire are satisfyingly thunderous, while a key scene of outdoor gun fire is surprisingly subdued, as the sound of a pistol fades into the distance instead of echoing off any surrounding walls. Dynamic range is broad, as one would expect from a contemporary mix, and the dialogue is always clear, except for some of the more extreme Russian accents. The soundtrack by French composer Laurent Eyquem (Winnie Mandela) is alternately energetic and doleful, which are the two basic strands of the story.

Rage Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras 

• The Making of Rage (1080p; 1.78:1): This collection of short featurettes assembles interviews with director Cabezas, Cage, Glover, Nichols, Stormare and others. It's frustrating, because the participants seem like they have a lot to say, but they don't get enough time to express themselves fully. A "play all" function is included.
• Behind Rage (1:25)
• Directing Rage (2:01)
• Nicolas Cage in Rage (1:53)



• Deleted Scenes (1080p; 2.35:1): What's most striking about these scenes is the insight they provide into the editing process. The final cut pared away elements of Paul Maguire's history and moved others to later in the film, achieving an appropriate balance between current events and disclosures about the past. A "play all" function is included here as well.
• Alternate Opening (5:44)
• After the Press Conference (1:41)
• We Did Everything Right (2:42)
• Alternate Ending (3:23)
• Extended Ending Shot (1:34)



• Additional Trailers: The film's trailer is not included. At startup the disc plays trailers for Odd Thomas, The Colony and The Numbers Station, which can be skipped with the chapter forward button and are not otherwise available once the disc loads.

Rage Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation 

Rage is certainly not a major entry in Nicolas Cage's filmography, but neither is it an embarrassment. If one does not approach it expecting either an artistic triumph like Leaving Las Vegas or a popcorn classic like The Rock, then there's more than enough here to hold one's attention. On that basis, recommended.