Up until very recently, director Stephen Campanelli’s Grand Isle shared the unwanted distinction of being Nicolas Cage’s worst-rated movie on Rotten Tomatoes, and one of just three from the Academy Award winner’s back catalogue stuck on zero percent.
On the plus side, that meant there was technically nowhere to go but up, and a full two and a half years after its initial release in January of 2020, a critic finally decided to leave a positive review for the interminable action thriller to move it off the bottom of the pile.
That’s about the smallest mercy you can possibly imagine, though, because being deemed as one of Cage’s worst from his decade trawling the VOD doldrums is hardly an accolade worth shouting about. Then again, people are clearly still watching the film, seeing as FlixPatrol has named it as one of the most-watched features on the global charts of both Prime Video and ViaPlay this weekend.
Cage stars as a traumatized war veteran who lures a young and handsome stranger into the Victorian-era home he shares with his neglected wife to offer shelter from an incoming hurricane, only for Kelsey Grammer’s detective to ultimately charge the newcomer with a murder.
In turn, that forces him to expose the secrets he’d discovered about the mysterious couple in order to save himself, something the residents of the opulent abode naturally don’t welcome with open arms. Grand Isle isn’t just a bargain basement genre flick, it’s a bargain basement Nicolas Cage genre flick, which tells you all you need to know.
