Only the hardiest of Nicolas Cage fans would make a point of barreling through the actor’s entire back catalogue, largely due to the sheer volume of movies he appeared in during the height of his decade in the VOD doldrums. The Academy Award winner signed on for so much that so many of them have long since been forgotten about, of which The Humanity Bureau was part until recently.
Per FlixPatrol, the turgid sci-fi with an environmentally-conscious message that couldn’t score any higher than 25 percent with either critics and crowds on Rotten Tomatoes has somehow wound up as one of the most-watched features on Paramount Plus. It’s okay if you don’t remember it – or even knew that it existed – because it came at the apex of Cage’s quantity-over-quality era.
There’s not even a hint of exaggeration in play, either, with The Humanity Bureau just one of the seven credits he racked up in 2018 alone, which was sandwiched in between a quartet of 2017 releases, and another seven that came down the pipeline in 2019. Thankfully, the walking meme is embarking on something of a renaissance, which hopefully ensures a cavalcade of dreck isn’t on the horizon.
In the case of director Rob W. King mundane effort, it involves a near-future dystopia where the American Midwest has become a barren desert landscape. In an effort to turn the tide, the titular organization exiles unproductive members of society and casts them out to a colony. Naturally, Cage’s caseworker ends up being drawn into an overarching conspiracy, one that it’s incredibly difficult to care about given how unstoppably tedious the entire operation is from start to finish.
