Face/Off

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Matthew D John Woo directs his own insane Eyes Without a Face as an action thriller! Hong Kong director John Woo’s sci-fi action thriller Face/Off (1997) goes off the rails immediately and it’s simply hilarious. John Woo has his signature doves fly up in the air, machine gun bullets flying everywhere, and crazy camera angles for an exhilarating display of violence. The real charm of watching Face/Off is witnessing Nicolas Cage and John Travolta do unflattering impressions of one another in increasingly bizarre performances. Writers Michael Colleary and Mike Werb write a wild script of a determined FBI agent, who switches faces with his rival terrorist, all to stop a bomb from going off. Seeing these actors go through a world of emotions from zany jokes, deep emotional despair, furious anger, and sheer frustration. John Travolta is ultra serious, cool, funny, and often moving as FBI agent Sean Archer. Nicolas Cage is awesome as the terrorist Castor Troy. His wild outbursts are hilarious, but Cage can also do a huge range of emotions. When he’s pretending to be Travolta and upset at his enemy’s actions, while he’s stuck in prison is quite touching, actually. Joan Allen is wonderful as the loving wife Eve Archer with her grief and loneliness. Alessandro Nivola is excellent as the crazy scientist brother Pollux Troy. Gina Gershon is great as the flirty girlfriend to Castor called Sasha Hassler. She portrays a considerate mother and guns ablaze criminals. Dominique Swain is great as the teenage daughter Jamie Archer. Nick Cassavetes is funny as the drug dealer Dietrich Hassler. Colm Feore is zany as the excitable face switching Dr. Malcolm Walsh. John Carroll Lynch is amusing as the sadistic Prison Guard Walton. CCH Pounder is stern and commanding as FBI Agent Hollis Miller. I loved seeing Margaret Cho as FBI Agent Wanda Chang. Thomas Jane is fantastic as the entertaining prisoner Burke Hicks. Tommy Flanagan is great as Leo too. You even get to see John Travolta kick the absolute trash out of Danny Masterson. Editors Steven Kemper and Christian Wagner do intense cutting for really stylish edits. Cinematographer Oliver Wood’s chaotic close-ups and wide shots make for super exciting visuals. I’m glad executive producer Michael Douglas got Face/Off made with so much of John Woo’s eclectic style. The icy lighting by James B. Crawford and Michael Laws is outstanding. Composer John Powell’s film score is so exciting, but also finds the tender melodies for the emotional beats. Costume designer Ellen Mirojnick’s outfits are really fashionable and fiery. In all, Face/Off is a bizarre and hysterical 139 minutes. Rated 5/5 Stars •  Rated 5 out of 5 stars 02/05/25 Full Review Jack S The overwhelmingly positive Tomatometer reviews for Face/Off can be attributed entirely to 3 sensational action sequences, in addition to the stylishly fun performances by the two leads (Travolta as the charismatic Castor Troy character but, NOT his mostly spiritless turn as Sean Archer). Also Joan Allen is outstanding in a role that she makes much more of than a typical action movie wife/victim character). However, it’s not all good. For example, it goes on much too long, the FBI agents are comically incompetent and the dialog is often just plain laughable. One—of many—hilarious examples (this from Cage as the Sean Archer character to his wife): “I’m your husband, but only if you don’t look at my face or listen to my voice”). Rated 3/5 Stars •  Rated 3 out of 5 stars 01/25/25 Full Review mark g I've heard of suspension of disbelief in order to enjoy a movie that is somewhat farfetched. However, this film requires a suspension of all intelligence. Too dumb to warrant any respect. Rated 0.5/5 Stars •  Rated 0.5 out of 5 stars 01/20/25 Full Review Benjamin H Bathing in its ludicrous nature and the amusing performances by John Travolta and Nicolas Cage, Face/Off is a conceptually interesting action extravaganza that is jacked up on John Woo's stylistic trademarks while also having themes of love and grief that fits nicely in with the kind of movie this is. The film is sometimes a bit chaotic and inconsistent, which is also reflected in some of the editing at times, but this was overall an enjoyable watch. Rated 3.5/5 Stars •  Rated 3.5 out of 5 stars 01/12/25 Full Review John C ‘Face/Off’ is a kind of simple film for simple people (and I’m including myself in that demographic). Take one bad guy (Nicholas Cage – cranked up to 11) and then, through a series of bizarre and totally implausible events, he finds himself with his face – literally – swapped with the good guy/cop (John Travolta –also doing his best to crank his performance up to 11) who’s out to catch him. Now, no one believes which one is which and the two of them start trying to take over each other’s lives (while trying to murder each other, obviously). If that brief plot summary hasn’t made you ask more than a few questions regarding the hows and whys of it all, then you really are an expert at suspending your disbelief. Most people would already be picking holes in the story. So, if you’re looking for a watertight plot with no holes in it, you probably should really skip this one. Luckily, Face/Off his just so much fun that you’ll find it easy to gloss over the general absurdities of it all, sit back, break open the popcorn and just roll with it. It is one of the most obviously over-the-top films ever made and, if the plot wasn’t over-the-top enough, then the two leads – Cage and Travolta – spend the film constantly trying to outdo each other as to how extreme they can make their performances. So, take the over-the-top film, add the completely over-the-top performances then, just to finish it off, add the completely unrealistic gunfights and those weird ‘Hollywood-type’ explosions where fireworks seem to shoot out of the flames. What you effectively have here is a B-movie with a decent cast and budget. It carries the film through and will always elevate it over the general mediocre action flicks that go straight to DVD. Basically, it’s a classic – not in the same way as the ‘Godfather’ or ‘Empire Strikes Back,’ but it is a classic for what it is – and what it is is big, dumb, stupid fun. So, if you can appreciate that sort of film, you should definitely get something out of this. Best bit: Nicholas Cage dressed as a priest ‘headbanging’ in a chorus. I will remember that until the day I die. Rated 3.5/5 Stars •  Rated 3.5 out of 5 stars 12/24/24 Full Review Jonathan O A thrilling crazy roller-coaster powerful action thriller both Cage and Travolta did really phenomenal performance playing cat and mouse and playing each other's characters and the stunts are truly unbelievable and amazing and scripts are so wild and very great writing and spectacular cinematography and really fantastic sound effects. Rated 5/5 Stars •  Rated 5 out of 5 stars 12/20/24 Full Review Read all reviews

Face/Off

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