With the Prime Video series Spider-Noir, Nicolas Cage seals his reputation as one of the weirdest and most watchable American actors. Who else but Nicolas Cage to play an ageing detective in 1930s New York City who also happens to be a web-slinging vigilante?
Ben Reilly (Cage) is a world-weary, wisecracking private investigator who walked off the pages of a novel by Dashiell Hammett or Raymond Chandler. Reilly is also Spider, with arachnid genetic material running through his veins.
The death of his fiance put an end to Reilly’s vigilantism. But he’s drawn back into the rescuing game when he witnesses the death of a man who can conjure up fire with his hands. The pyrokinetic victim is a link to the origins of Reilly’s own transformation from soldier into a version of Spider-Man.
During his investigation, Reilly meets the mysterious club singer Cat (Li Jun Li). Reilly also runs into other men with similar superpowers – Flint (Jack Huston), Lonnie (Abraham Popoola) and Dirk (Anderw Lewis Caldwell).
Mob boss Silverman (Brendan Gleeson) wants to control these supervillains and wreak havoc on New York City. The stage is set for a dazzling, zinger-filled battle between humans and superhumans, gumshoes and gangsters, the crime thriller and superhero genres.
Duality is a big theme in Spider-Noir, based on the Marvel Comics character from an alternate Spider-Man universe. Developed by Oren Uziel and Steve Lightfoot and directed by Harry Bradbeer, Nzingha Stewart, Alethea Jones and Greg Yaitanes, the show has been released in two handsomely produced versions.
The black-and-white edition reinforces the noir aspect of the title. The angularity of the sets feels heightened, the characters more at home with the hardboiled tone, the plotting closer to the adventurous, risk-taking cinema of this period.
The colour version, which is dunked in a lushly retro palette and filled with gorgeous costumes and hot emotions, resembles neo-noir films such as Chinatown and LA Confidential. Although Spider-Noir takes place during the Great Depression, there are few signs of impoverishment, except in Reilly’s anxiety over being able to pay his bills.
The dense writing retains the fundamental strangeness, cynicism and romanticism of noir fiction from the 1930s. Several characters have hidden motivations. The police and government officials are not to be trusted. The amoral sleuth somehow emerges as the moral centre.
The show’s dialogue is a sound approximation of the prose found in novels and films from this period. Dastardly experiments and rogue scientists expand, as well as enhance, the scope of Spider-Noir.
Deft plotting, brittle humour and sharp performances hold steady over eight episodes. Apart from Nicolas Cage, who is in raging form in his series debut, Spider-Noir has a bunch of memorable supporting characters.
These include Karen Rodriguez as Janet, Reilly’s wise secretary, and Lamorne Morris as Robbie, a muckraking journalist who helps Reilly in his endeavours. Brendan Gleeson is both entertaining and sinister as Silverman.
Nicolas Cage has numerous scenes that are throwbacks to his previous unhinged performances as well as homages to the devil-may-care anti-heroes of the 1930s. Cage is knowingly off-kilter and centred, self-deprecating and tender, canonical and irreverent.
It’s hard to imagine Spider-Noir with anybody else. Much of the show’s impact is down to an actor whose unpredictability is his most consistent feature.
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