Gleefully weird and unabashedly artsy-fartsy, Japanese director/provocateur Sion Sono’s fanciful art direction and bat shit crazy performances from the supporting cast combine to make Nicolas Cage the least strange element of Prisoners of the Ghostland. It’s a fun watch, if you just sit back and laugh. I liked it.
At first, I was confused and impatient, so I cheated and looked up the plot, including spoilers. Ah-turns out I was trying too hard. The film is basically a Sergio Leone Western and David Lynch hybrid. And its story arc is simple, once you ignore the trippy trappings:
It’s a frontier town, isolated and like a Cowboy Western town, only it’s in a post-apocalyptic part of Japan and is populated with Japanese, A Frenchman, An American Warlord and Nicolas Cage, a man with no name (but, of course) who violently robs a bank in the opening minutes and is sent to prison.
The warlord, a creepy guy in a white suit and cowboy hat who keeps a harem of “granddaughters” with him, is upset that one of those ladies, played by Algerian actress Sofia Boutella, has run away or been kidnapped. He offers Cage a deal – go get my “granddaughter” and bring her safely back and you’ll be freed.
BUT.
BUT.
Cage must wear a leather one piece suit that has explosive sensors on it – if he isn’t back in 3 days, it will explode. If he gets sexual with the young lady…it will explode. If he raises his voice and gets angry with her…it will explode. The explosives are attached to the suit at his neck and at his testicles.
I never spoil plots, so here is the general description: Cage is super quiet. Again, like the Spaghetti Westerns, he doesn’t say too much, doesn’t have a name, doesn’t have a past. His road trip will indeed take him to the titular Ghostland where the prisoners are outcasts, having been irradiated by an unseen nuclear incident that made them freaky folks.
Cage and Boutella are just right and Bill Mosely as The Governor (warlord) delightfully chews the scenery and makes a deliciously evil bad guy.
It’s not for everybody, but it’s gorgeously filmed and decorated and features some terrifically violent Samurai sword fights that action fans will dig. Heads will roll.
Prisoners of the Ghostland is now streaming on Shudder. You can often get free trials or pay for one month – it’s cheap.
