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The acclaimed actor is likely the perfect choice for a audacious horror film focused on Jesus Christ, though not for the reasons many viewers may think. Truthfully, the star does not actually act as Jesus in the new film: his role is referred to simply as a craftsman. The actor is positioned as the Joseph of this tale, striving to maintain his religious convictions while The Boy (acted by Noah Jupe), his adolescent foster child, begins to show miraculous gifts. Why it's challenging to imagine another major actor playing this part is that even as the role becomes burdened with numerous difficulties, the actor seems practically moving confident that the gloomy, grim little movie is deserving of his effort.

Cage's Current Career Choices

Nicolas Cage has been allocating his time more carefully recently. He still makes more films than the majority of regular audiences will ever see — for example, did you know that the man has completed several different cowboy movies in the past three years? — but he also adds prestige critically acclaimed roles for example Dream Scenario, Pig, and Longlegs. The Carpenter’s Son seems like one of those, because it’s genre-adjacent, potentially provocative, and handles a over-the-top description with gravity.

The Film's Storyline and Execution

Unfortunately, filmmaker Lotfy Nathan does not justify that serious attention. The Carpenter’s Son begins with a interestingly wandering context, marketed as drawing from an apocryphal lost gospel regarding the early years of Jesus. The Carpenter, the maternal figure, and their child relocate from place to place, anxious of doctrinal intolerance or suspicion regarding The Boy’s strange powers. “Disaster trails us,” Cage gloomily remarks. It goes on as dark forces focus on the family in their latest settlement, beginning with that traditional religious challenge for The Boy.

At times, this production echoes an demonic possession-type horror film, though none of the lead characters are explicitly taken over. Instead, they grow more and more distant from each other, while these entities influence a local young woman (Isla Johnston, credited as “The Stranger”) who the son forms a relationship with, and provides each character troubling visions of a dark tomorrow. Cage's role notably fights with his place within the plot, at times berating his child he can’t fully understand.

Debate and Caution

This material is prone to invite debate, and Nathan treats it with much delicacy — too much, maybe. The concept of a adolescent facing his future martyrdom and tempted by dark influences is indeed frightening, but Nathan might be cautious about seeming gratuitous and keen to signal his aims, thus he frequently withdraws to darkly ominous cinematography. The roles continually reflect — the singer-actress, who demonstrated real promise in another movie, of all things — cedes her performance to her character's costume, sometimes broken up by a few gruesome scary visuals.

Cage's Acting and Film's Flaws

At the same time, Cage flirts with just the sort of exaggerated performance that his more snickering appreciators might be looking for. One scene (also included) in promotional material where he erupts and yells “My belief is broken!” When this sort of florid outburst is included in a Jesus-themed horror movie, possibly a more openly absurd method would take better advantage of Cage’s willingness to go over the top as required. Instead, The Carpenter’s Son echoes the weaker straight-to-DVD productions Cage made through much of the 2010s — excluding the campy action films but rather the narrative films and supernatural thrillers that typically appear interesting, and frequently include some select actor's highlights, but ultimately feel like, frankly, cheap home video fare.

Truthfully, a number of those, while less ambitious, were easier to view overall. At this point I have to disregard my personal rule, not religious but career-related: Previously, a respected mentor persuaded me to remove words like “boring” or “dull” from my analytical lexicon. Such terms communicate minimal except a personal and broadly stated lack of patience, avoiding the duty of clearly expressing the intellectual and sensation of viewing a specific film. It's hard to communicate tedium without seeming uninteresting yourself. It's equally vague as calling a movie “notable.” “Explain further,” in other words.

But I must confess, I was bored throughout the film. To the movie’s non-exploitative credit, it is a churchy kind of boredom, not for The Carpenter’s Son is preachy, but since it demands a kind of dutiful submission to view it. After a while early on, the film settles into a repetitive rhythm of ongoing suffering, and fails to