As hard as it might be to believe these days, there was once a time when every Nicolas Cage project went straight to the big screen. Over the last decade, though, the Academy Award winner has been plumbing the depths of VOD mediocrity and hasn’t seen any of his live-action star vehicles secure a wide theatrical release for years, but his B-movie future was foreshadowed as early as 2011 thanks to the double whammy of supernatural fantasy Season of the Witch and 3D actioner Drive Angry.
The latter saw Cage play a convict who literally escapes from hell after a cult murders his daughter and steals her baby, and the schlocky throwback is just as insane as that brief synopsis makes it sound. The sort of enjoyably trashy flick that goes down well late at night, Drive Angry had no pretensions about being high art and fully embraces the sheer insanity of the concept.
The movie bombed at the box office after failing to even recoup the $50 million budget, but has gone on to find something of a second life as an underground cult favorite. And now, insider Daniel Richtman is claiming that a sequel is actively in the works, with both Cage and Amber Heard reportedly reprising their roles.
Although no further details are available, a Drive Angry follow-up hardly seems like a viable proposition for the studio. An effects-heavy sequel to a film that bombed the first time around, starring an actor who hasn’t headlined a genuinely successful effort for years and co-starring an actress that’s constantly found herself in the news for all the wrong reasons recently doesn’t exactly have the makings of a smash hit. But then again, this is Hollywood we’re talking about and stranger things have certainly happened.
