The Runner (2015)

Plenty to Like, Plenty to Dislike

Please don't spend money on this.

Great Film overall

The film may be flawed, but its message is not.

Pay the Ghost was one of the few good Cage movies that i was surprised and i actually liked and this one was another big surprise Nicholas Cage in this movie gives a really good performance and he's probably the only character i felt sorry for him including Peter Fonda. Everyone else tried to use him even his wife said that she loved him but if he didn't run for Senetor she would leave him? really? This movie is basically a political thriller and even if i said that the film was good it still has problems sometimes the dialogue was pretty bad and you can tell pretty easy. With it's ups and downs the movie was OK and i was surprised by Cage's performance. 7/10

Review: What a totally boring film! I was expecting something slightly interesting about this political drama but it just turned out to be another let down from Nicolas Cage. The pace of the film is slow and I personally lost interest, 5 minutes into the film. Cage plays politician, Colin Pryce, whose fighting for help from BP and the US government during the 2010 BP oil spill. Due to his womanising, he's forced to leave his political life behind and he seeks comfort from alcohol, which he previously had problems with. After splitting from his wife, he tries to help the families who are struggling to make a living in the fishing industry but no one takes him seriously because of his widely publicised personal life. He then gets the funding from a rich benefactor who wants him to go back into politics so he can help BP during the spillage crisis, so he's left with the decision to either help the people or to continue his political career against his own personal morals. And that's were the movie ends... Very uninteresting! Cage does show a little bit of emotion, during a speech about the problems that the BP spillage has caused the families but apart from that, the performances were extremely average. The storyline doesn't really go anywhere and the director didn't introduce any interesting characters to perk up the bland concept. Anyway, this movie definitely gets the thumbs down from me but on the plus side, my expectations wasn't that high because Cage hasn't made a decent film for ages. Disappointing!Round-Up: I'm starting to think that Nicolas Cage doesn't read his scripts before he stars in these low budget movies because they have all been pretty awful. At 52 years old, but looking much older, he still has time to regenerate his career to an Oscar standard but he has to stop starring in this mediocre movies, alongside C-Class actors. He does have another National Treasure in development but apart from that, he doesn't have any promising projects in the pipeline. It just seems like he's thrown in the towel at a time when Hollywood needs some decent actors. Anyway, this movie was directed by Austin Stark who has only directed 2 shorts in his whole career. You can tell that he hasn't had that much experience behind the camera because he missed out key elements in the storyline. For his first project, he was lucky to get Nicolas Cage on board but he didn't take full advantage of the opportunity.Budget: $6million Worldwide Gross: N/AI recommend this movie to people who are into their dramatic movies starring Nicolas Cage, Sarah Paulson, Peter Fonda and Connie Nielsen. 2/10

I think this film has been underrated. Everyday we make compromises just to get through the day. Nicolas Cage shows us a man who has ideals and is striving to live up to those ideals, helping the fishing industry of Louisiana. He refuses to compromise with the oil industry. He resigns because his position has been compromised because of marriage infidelity. He finds happiness with his political consultant as he and his wife begin to divorce, but his consultant decides to work on her own marriage and he has to compromise again and go back to his wife who has become his second choice. We see him struggling and hurting showing the emotions of grief, loss and struggling to keep his dream alive.In the end he makes the big compromise and runs for the Senate with the oil company backing him and he struggles to give the speech in which he says life is about compromise.I really liked it. If you want a movie about heroes watch Avengers or Iron Man. If you want a reminder of how good people strive to be heroic for others and do the best they can in a broken world watch The Runner.

"Great men, men who build legacies, they aren't always decent." After giving an impassioned speech talking about the effects of the BP oil spill in Louisiana Congressman Colin Price (Cage) is poised to make a run for the Senate. When a scandal is revealed his career is over. Now, after losing everything he has to chose between wanting to make a real difference, or becoming like every other politician. I don't think I even need to state this anymore but I am not a Nicolas Cage fan at all. There have been a few of his movies I liked (National Treasure, Rock) but not because of him, it was the idea and actual movie I liked. This movie falls under that category. It may have been because of the political aspect but this was very interesting to me and watching a politician build himself back up is inspiring, especially when it is someone who is really trying to make a positive change. Not many of those in real life. Overall, a really good movie that Cage didn't screw up with his acting. His best in a while. I give it a B+.