One man changes his face for heroic reasons and is treated like a villain. Another changes his face for nefarious reasons and is regarded as a hero. Face/Off, Hong Kong auteur John Woo's second American film after the masterful Broken Arrow, explores the malleability of identity as most-dangerous-man-alive Castor Troy (Nicolas Cage) and revenge-driven supercop Sean Archer (John Travolta) deal with how the world treats them and how they perceive themselves in each other's skin. As they inhabit each other's lives and continue their personal conflict, they become more closely intertwined until the final battle concludes. The hints - including the use of the names Castor and Pollux - intimate that what we're witnessing is not a war between two separate entities, but an everyday struggle between the id and ego. As is typical of this brilliant film that emphasizes internal duality, the epilogue does not provide us with a concrete resolution as to who wins in this struggle. Yes, a restored Sean Archer returns to his house and takes in Troy's son, but there's a dreamy haze in this scene that isn't present elsewhere in the film. Are we seeing the actual triumph of ego over id, or is this just the ego's dying hallucination as it yields to the id's might? Like David Lynch's Mulholland Drive, perhaps we're seeing both.
Or maybe this is just an excuse to blow shit up and enjoy Travolta and Cage's overacting/impressions of each other. It certainly is fun to see those and John Woo is no slouch at melodramatic action sequences. His visual trademarks - from doves to slow-motion to Mexican standoffs - are all here. While the action is relatively exciting at a time when CGI has taken some of the fun out of stunts, there are only so many minutes I can accept that elite terrorists and lawmen have such bad aim and the long running time (2 hours and 12 minutes) begins to take its toll on my suspension of disbelief and level of interest. The real fun of the film is watching Travolta and Cage pretend to be each other, taking on each other's mannerisms and getting some pretty solid laughs out of it. Cage as Archer is especially good as he looks in the mirror and recognizes himself as the person he hates most.
Face/Off made John Woo a household name and provides a fair amount of entertainment from the Cage/Travolta mugging, but it also makes us question some crucial parts of these types of big-budget popcorn movies. Why should we care whether these characters save their family/friends/world when their relationships to them looks hollow?
Directed by John Woo (The Killer, Mission: Impossible 2, Red Cliff)
Written by Mike Werb (The Mask, Lara Croft: Tomb Raider, Curious George) and Mike Colleary (Darkman III: Die Darkman Die, Firehouse Dog)
Cast
John Travolta - Sean Archer / Castor Troy
Nicolas Cage - Castor Troy / Sean Archer
Joan Allen - Dr. Eve Archer
Alessandro Nivola - Pollux Troy
Gina Gershon - Sasha Hassler
Dominique Swain - Jamie Archer