By Eugene Golant
Nicolas Cage’s newest film, Knowing came out atop of the box office this past weekend grossing just shy of $25 million in ticket sales domestically according to Box Office Mojo. This marks a strong showing for Cage considering the numerous competition he faced from films like the comedy I Love You, Man, which debuted in second place with $18 million and the thriller Duplicity with Julia Roberts and Clive Owen which came in third place grossing about $14 million. This also makes a win for Knowing‘s distributor Summit which has been on a hot streak after produced last year’s hit Twilight.
Cage can be hit or miss at the box office these days. In the past five years he has started in such domestic flops as Next, Wicker Man and The Weather Man. His last film Bangkok Dangerous underperformed too grossing just $15 million domestically last fall. However, he also made two successful National Treasure sequels which together grossed over $800 million worldwide. In the past years Cage has taking roles in numerous big studio pictures, skewing away from smaller productions such as his last few critically acclaimed films like Matchstick Men and Adaptation.
Cage’s career really took off after he won the best actor academy award for the 1995 film Leaving Las Vegas. He became a successful action start with a slew of hits like The Rock, Con Air and Face/Off – all of which grossed over $100M at the domestic box office. Knowing‘s short-term success may only encourage Cage to keep pursuing such big production but critically panned pictures (his last 5 movies received sub-par reviews according to Rotten Tomatoes.)
Do you like the Ghost Rider, National Treasure, and Knowing Nicolas Cage or do you prefer the Adaption, Matchstick Men, Leaving Las Vegas and Raising Arizona Nicolas Cage?