In his autobiography, "Wide-Eyed in Babylon", Ray Milland told about witnessing a performance by Charles Laughton while co-starring with him in "Payment Deferred".

First Laughton rolled his eyes until only the whites showed. Then his lips twitched and quivered, and then he began to slobber. This went on until Milland was convinced Laughton was having an epileptic fit. Finally the director called, "Cut."

Milland discreetly asked the director whether he considered what he had just witnessed to be fine acting. The director assured him that it wasn't, simply sheer self-indulgence, but that Milland shouldn't start feeling superior because he would be doing it himself if he lasted that long. The director considered it an occupational disease with most actors.

This goes a long way towards explaining Nicholas Cage's performance in "Deadfall".

The film is about con men, involving the same con that was the basis of "The Sting". "Deadfall", made in 1993, predates 2003's "Confidence" in 'paying homage' to that great movie.

Joe Dolan, played by Michael Biehn is involved in a sting that goes wrong when he accidentally shoots and kills his father, Mike Dolan. With his dying words, Mike sends his son to find his Uncle Lou. Mike and Lou are both played by James Coburn.

Lou decides to bring Joe in on a life fulfilling "long" con and teams him up with Eddie, his right-hand man.

Eddie, played by Nicholas Cage, becomes stressed by Joe's presence and this leads to increasingly excessive behaviour. Cage's performance is startling. To portray Eddie's anger management issues, Cage must have felt that tantrums along the lines of a child experiencing the terrible twos would be about right. After a fight with his girlfriend, Cage lays on a bed kicking and screaming. Cage also adopted a false nose for the role as though he knew he was going to cut loose and possibly felt he needed a little anonymity.

One is forced to ask if the director, Christopher Copolla, had any control over Cage at all? The answer could lie in the fact that Nicholas Cage is Christopher Copolla's brother – his little bro' in fact.

Joe becomes involved in his uncle's scam. The mark is one Dr. Lyme, who has a taste for beautiful diamonds. Distractingly, the doctor wears an artificial hand that features a large pair of scissors not unlike Edward Scissorhands' in hedge trimming mode. This arresting prosthesis gives his character a cartoonish quality – just another odd element in a movie that lacks a consistent style.

The scam goes down, and the movie ends with a series of twists that are too contrived to create much impact. "Deadfall" is unbalanced by some extreme characterisations, and is so derivative that there is not much originality left in the film – other than Nicholas Cage's performance that is.

Possibly one of Nic Cage's most stellar performances (on a completely non-serious level, of course). The movie is absolutely ridiculous with Michael Biehn as the lead, and never loses steam through the twists and turns of absurdity. Worth checking out just for Cage's scattered coke-driven scenes. This'll be a new yearly tradition in my household with mandatory viewing for all.

This was well on its way to high marks and I thought I had purchased a real "sleeper" or "find" in the previously-viewed VHS rack a decade ago but the last 40 minutes of the film made it a "thumbs down" reject. In that time period, there were about 20 usages of the Lord's name in vain. James Coburn accounted for eight alone in a period of one minute and 20 seconds! That ruined the film for me.

The final half of this movie wasn't that good anyway, with a confusing storyline and an unsatisfying ending. All of the above was a shame because the first half of this is very interesting and nicely filmed. It had good style to it and Nicholas Cage's character, "Eddie," was so outrageous it made the movie fun to watch. He was unbelievable!! In fact, when he went a little too berserk and was killed, the film went down the tubes.