As decades go, the 1990s was a unique one for entertainment. It was a great time for movies in particular, with iconic movies across every genre hitting theaters and delighting audiences, not to mention filmmakers taking big risks and trying new things. The creative risks of the decade saw huge rewards with the advancement of CGI as well as the delivery of films that helped to define the decade — and continue to have impact even today. But the 1990s wasn’t without some wild cards as well and now, one of the decade’s most unhinged and over the top sci-fi blockbusters has returned to Paramount+.
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1997’s Face/Off is once again streaming on Paramount+, less than a month after having departed Netflix. The sci-fi thriller stars Nicolas Cage and John Travolta in what might be the most insane story ever: they play a terrorist and an FBI agent respectively who undergo experimental surgery that sees them literally swap faces, voices, pretty much their entire appearances so that the agent can obtain the location of a bomb. Even with its wild premise, Face/Off was a huge hit.
Despite The Bonkers Premise, Face/Off Is a Great Movie
The idea of an FBI agent effectively trading places with a terrorist to get some information (even if it would prevent a bombing) sounds genuinely insane and, as you can probably guess it works out predictably with Cage’s terrorist Castor Troy capitalizing on his swapped identity with Travolta’s agent Sean Archer. However, despite the wild premise, Face/Off is a truly great film. A huge part of what makes the film work so well and makes it so entertaining is that both Cage and Travolta are not just playing characters, but they are playing characters who are in turn playing the other actor’s character as well. It creates a fascinating layering effect and shows off the range of both performers in a manner unlike any of their other work.
Face/Off is also a very stylish film. Director John Woo makes excellent use of the same style and aesthetic from his Hong Kong films to Face/Off, particularly with the use of slow-motion and unique camera angles that make the movie’s excessive and over-the-top at times violence downright elegant. There’s something graceful about it. When combined with the performances — that are both incredibly skilled and just toe the line of camp — and the wild premise, the result is one of the most unhinged movies of the 1990s that is also hands-down one of the best. It’s so good that fans are still clamoring for a sequel decades later — and we’re still waiting.
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