Unlike America’s Dad, Tom Hanks, Nicolas Cage never seems like an entirely ordinary guy, on or offscreen. Even as the titular heroine’s high-school sweetheart in Peggy Sue Got Married, one of Cage’s first big films, the actor affects an unnaturally nasal voice and alien-like aura to seem far from your average teenager. (He’s no more down to earth as an adult later in the film.) In his next married-with-children role in Raising Arizona, Cage is not an average Joe but an eccentric outlaw who resorts to kidnapping to fulfill domestic dreams. 

Not even in The Family Man does Cage come across as a genuine everyman. As a Wall Street wolf in suburban sheep’s clothing, that character is more akin to his role in Face/Off, which requires him to play a man held captive in another’s identity. Part of Cage’s appeal lies in watching him squirm around while wearing other people’s skin. Even when he’s playing a guy grounded in contemporary reality, he can’t seem to help but lash out like a wild animal. 

Paul, whom Cage plays in his newest film, Arcadian, may be the performer’s most “normal” father role. While Paul’s circumstances are extreme — raising two teenage sons on a secluded farm in a post-apocalyptic world — his demeanor is familiar. You may recognize your own parents when his face quickly contorts between grin and grimace while teaching Joseph (Jaeden Martell) how to drive. And you’ll feel his fatherly warmth when his instinct to lecture the reckless Thomas (Maxwell Jenkins) gives way to a loving embrace. Whenever the boys fight each other or talk back at him, he calmly says, “That’s not helping,” and in Cage’s hands, this statement lands with a sharper sting than any threat or insult parents typically toss around. 

Cage’s Paul is essentially the firm, steady rock at the heart of the film’s fragile, crumbling world. Director Benjamin Brewer and cinematographer Frank Mobilio beautifully visualize this idea with a wide shot of Paul resting against a tree beside a cascading waterfall. 

Brewer creates a rich atmosphere out of this rustic setting. (The crew shot the film in Ireland.) You can practically feel the wind whipping across the fields and against your face. When Paul and his boys are in the midst of their daily grind, you’ll feel dirt growing beneath your fingernails as well. If only the post-apocalyptic monsters preying upon them were as vivid and tactile.

Cage basically plays the straight man to the film’s outlandish — and, at times, laughable — nocturnal creatures. When Cage saw an early design of the creature, with puppy dog eyes and spaced-out teeth, he said, “I can’t kill that. It’s like a Goofy plush toy.” Little did he know Brewer actually based the creature on the classic Disney character. (Considering Brewer served as a lead visual effects designer on Everything Everywhere All At Once, what he imagines here is a bit disappointing.) 

Unfortunately, Cage’s feedback didn’t lead to a much scarier monster. But his surprisingly subdued performance effectively makes them all the more bizarre. For me, that’s the subversive joy of this film — how it puts Cage’s atypical arthouse performance in the middle of a B-movie creature feature. 

The other major strength of the film is the lived-in dynamic between Paul and his sons. Screenwriter Mike Nilon never fully reveals the cataclysmic events that created the film’s reality, but we do find out the boys were born into it, never knowing a world without such chaos. And it’s never too hard to believe that they persevere because they have Paul — Cage’s most endearing, relatable dad role yet.