Three movies this month and counting: Has the world had too much Nicolas Cage?

As our neighbours to the south prepare to gorge on Thanksgiving bounties and Black Friday sales, they will have three — three! — new Nic Cage films to feast on.    

Cage has always been a man of excess. His freak outs are the freakiest, his screams are loud and strained, he laughs like nothing could be funnier, and that twisted bug-eyed glare has no equal. In short, the man commits.

But even by Cage's standard, releasing three films over a two-week stretch is a lot. And their plots are classic Cage.

In Paul Schrader's Dog Eat Dog, Cage plays an ex-con hired by a Cleveland mafioso to kidnap the baby of a rival mobster.  

He gets top billing in Mario Van Peebles' USS Indianapolis: Men of Courage, playing the captain of a WWII American Navy ship sunk by a Japanese submarine in shark-infested waters.

In Army of One, directed by Larry Charles of Borat fame, Cage plays an American who travels to Pakistan to capture Osama bin Laden — armed only with a samurai sword and instructions from God. It is a very, very Cage-like role.

What will happen in Nic Cage's next film? You decide:

How much Cage is too much Cage?

Nic Cage fans like the fact that he's everywhere all the time. He's fun because he's unpredictable and almost always good — depending on what your definition of good happens to be.

Remember, this is the same actor who won an academy award for Leaving Las Vegas. He's been the star of critically acclaimed movies like Joe and Adaptation as well as box office juggernauts like Con Air and The Croods.

These days, he's better known for his cult flicks like Kick-Ass and Bad Lieutenant: Port of Call — or from the many, many memes that have been created in his name.

Cage has always been prolific. He hasn't taken a single year off since 1981. But lately, critics have seen more misses than hits, leading some to ask whether he should slow things down.

With that in mind, Nathalie Atkinson and Norm Wilner joined Day 6 host Brent Bambury to debate whether the world has had enough of Nic Cage.

Nathalie is the arts and culture writer and film critic with the Globe and Mail. She says we don't need any more Nic Cage.

Norm Wilner is senior film writer for Now Magazine. He says the world is a better place with as much Nic Cage as possible.

Click the tab below to hear the debate:

Day 612:36Three movies this month and counting: Have we reached peak Nicolas Cage?

Nicolas Cage has three new movies out this month, all of them going straight to video on demand. Film critics Norm Wilner and Nathalie Atkinson debate whether the world had finally had enough of Cage’s bug-eyed eccentricity and unapologetic zaniness.