It’s hard to think of a modern movie star who inspires the same cultish devotion as Nicolas Cage. He’s always had the crazy in him (think Moonstruck, Wild At Heart, Face/Off, or even his notorious property portfolio) but Cage’s ability to pick interesting and unconventional projects and give them something truly extra has really accelerated recently. An often prolifically busy actor (he had six credits in 2023 alone), Cage has invigorated the likes of Longlegs, Dream Scenario, Renfield and Pig with his much-touted brand of ‘mega acting’.

Scorched by the heat of an Antipodean sun, The Surfer represents another fascinating filmic trip. The brainchild of Irish director Lorcan Finnegan, best known for 2019’s equally unnerving Vivarium, the film shadows an unnamed protagonist (Cage) who, after years of living in America, is trying to buy the Australian beachside property he grew up in, falling foul of some unsavoury characters along the way.

‘The Surfer’ (as he appears in the credits) begins proceedings by attempting to secure the funds needed to see off a rival bidder, before trying to bond with his unimpressed teenage son (Finn Little) by taking him surfing at the local beach. Unfortunately, the beach in question is fiercely guarded by a group dubbed the ‘Bay Boys’, led by Julian McMahon’s guru-like Scally. Described as a ‘bunch of fucking yuppies cosplaying at being surf gangsters’, this absurd gang’s threats send The Surfer into a doom spiral, during which he’s tormented by thoughts of his dead father and starts to lose his very sense of self.

The film is written by another Irish filmmaker, Thomas Martin, who was inspired by surf noir novels and John Cheever’s short story ‘The Swimmer’, alongside a violent incident he witnessed on a Sydney beach. Shot in Yallingup, Western Australia, The Surfer channels Ozploitation, the 70s and 80s boundary-breaking cinema epitomised by George Miller’s Mad Max series, with which it shares a certain sun-baked mania. It brings an outsider’s eye to Aussie culture and explores toxic male behaviour by throwing someone perceived as an intruder into the mix. There’s also an intense, western-esque revenge feel to all this, recalling Deliverance or Point Break at its most insane.

Finnegan directs with real flair, playing on stereotypes (including the corrupt, one-of-the-boys copper, effectively played by Animal Kingdom’s Justin Rosniak), while subverting the perception of Australia as a chummy, stress-free idyll, with the sun blinding and anxiety levels off the scale. Although The Surfer reaches a crescendo of impressive delirium, Finnegan and Martin bring things back from the brink courtesy of a neat and well thought-through concept and, despite some inevitable meandering as its protagonist struggles to keep hold of his sanity, the pair keep things admirably trim.

Still remembered for the sadism he showed on Ryan Murphy’s blackly comic surgical drama Nip/Tuck (and more recently popping up in Netflix’s murder-mystery comedy The Residence), McMahon is fittingly cast as Scally, bringing ample slippery charisma to the role. Australian cinema does obnoxious menace like no other, and the pack of bully boys that flank Scally (including Alexander Bertrand’s Pitbull and Rory O’Keeffe’s Blondie) are deliciously unpleasant. 

While 2022’s The Unbearable Weight Of Massive Talent felt a bit too knowing at times, The Surfer fits Cage like a glove. It’s another one to add to his list of must-see, maniacal performances, illustrating his incomparable commitment to the craft. He starts the film in a fairly modest register, giving him somewhere to go; and boy does he go there, capturing the desperation and increasing disorientation of a man being driven totally and utterly out of his mind.

The Surfer is in cinemas from Friday 9 May.