Nicolas Cage tries pointing for dollars

by John Boonstra - November 3, 2005

The Weather Man
Directed by Gore Verbinski. Screenwriter: Steve Conrad. Cast: Nicolas Cage, MIchael Caine, Hope Davis, Gemmenne de la Pena, Nicholas Hoult, Gil Bellows. (R)

You don't need a weatherman to know which way the wind goes, as the popular wisdom would have it, and that's definitely the case with Gore Verbinski's The Weather Man . Nicolas Cage stars as Chicago TV weather guy Dave Spritz, on the brink of landing a national gig while his personal life falls into ever deeper disarray. His father (Michael Caine) is diagnosed with a possibly terminal illness; his ex-wife (Hope Davis) won't have him back, his kids are enduring a mighty rocky adolescence...and, of course, the public throws crap at him every time a forecast goes wrong.
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Verbinski, whose intriguingly diverse track record leapfrogs from The Ring to Pirates of the Caribbean to this downbeat comedy-drama, has a genuine gift for narrative. Cage, Caine, Davis and Gemmenne de la Pena (as Cage's awkward, uneasy daughter) have swell moments throughout, and though there's a nagging sense that the whole thing just doesn't gel, perhaps that's the point: neither does our hero's mixed-up confusion. Which is not a message audiences are eager to embrace. Like Cage's recent outing Lord of War , this one is also failing to crack the five at the weekend boxoffice. Good for him for taking these huge risks; bad for us for failing to attend interesting and complicated motion pictures when they come our way.