Writer-Director Kristoffer Borgi creates a world for Nicolas Cage to shine in with Dream Scenario. With energy that seems ready to burst from a cage into wild directions, Cage specializes in characters who might look slightly normal but defy behavioral logic. With Dream Scenario he plays Paul Matthews, apt enough to earn university tenure yet too obtuse to relate well with students and fellow professors. Even before establishing these basics, writer-director Borgi throws in his plot’s fanciful ringer with a flashing mix of visuals that create a bizarre sense as objects fall and Paul stands around passively. It turns out Paul randomly shows up in other people’s dreams. It makes him part of their lives, a form of celebrity that draws them to him and leads to a story that explores several dimensions, especially the desire for fame and what it means to other aspects of life. Combining social satire and fantasy elements, works well with a solid cast that includes Juliane Nicholson, Dylan Baker, and Michael Cera. But Borgi soars with the presence of Cage, who reaches into his actor’s toolbox to change his voice, walk, and manner as he captures a basically dull man transformed into other people’s visions of him. This requires a range of presentations, from the Paul living in a real world to the one that surrounded by other people’s ideas. The film rides on the success of the right performer pulling it off, and the actor’s own public persona helps—seasoned movie watchers know to expect something beyond the ordinary from Nicolas Cage and he proves true to form with the intriguing, strange, and insightful world of
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