Nicolas Cage in Dying of the Light (Lionsgate)

I almost wish I didn’t know the circumstances surrounding the post-production and release of Dying of the Light, which is advertised as being written and directed by Paul Schrader, because, as reported in a number of news outlets (Variety and Slate), what we see is not the director’s cut. Apparently, Schrader had the right to first cut, but he did not have final cut, which is surprising after so many years making films, either as a writer (Taxi Driver) or as director (American Gigolo, Affliction, Adam Resurrected). The producers, according to Schrader, took away the film and re-edited it and added a score. The producers denied this saying they simply made minor tweaks and adjustments, but Schrader and the cast have since staged silent protests. This is not the first time this has happened to the filmmaker (an Exorcist prequel had this fate as well), and one hopes it’s the last.

The good news is that the structure, the story, and the dialog feels like a Schrader project. Like some of his other works, this is about obsession. He even once penned Obsession for Brian De Palma (1976), and this theme goes back to his collaborations with Scorsese in The Last Temptation of Christ or Bringing Out the Dead, the latter also featuring Nicolas Cage. The other good news is that Cage gives his best work in a while as a renowned CIA operative who has been diagnosed with dementia and who pursues one longtime target that he discovers has resurfaced.

Evan Lake is, like a lot of memorable Cage roles, intense (to say the least) and on edge. He’s been tortured in the past. In flashbacks, Muhammad Banir (Alexander Karim) gives him electric shocks to get information. Now, Lake’s dementia gets to him, but only in spots. So when he’s approached by a younger colleague (Anton Yelchin), he has to hide his ailment. This is where Cage gets to really “play” the character, so to speak.

Schrader centers the tale on Lake’s quest/obsession with revenge and on two men at the end of the line. Banir is older and sick, and it’s the illness—inspired, no doubt, by the reports of Bin Laden’s dialysis machine—that leads Lake to Banir step by incremental step. This sets up the plot, which is serviceable enough. And Yelchin gets to play the young straight arrow to Cage’s weathered veteran of these terrorist trails.

I have to wonder how much different Schrader’s version would be. The elements presented here seem straightforward enough. Maybe, in its way, too straightforward. The story goes from points A to B to C without too much in the way of experimentation. Albeit there are a couple of scenes where Schrader seems to be trying out things, technically speaking, in the interrogation/torture flashbacks, or when the dementia becomes unmanageable and the first-person point of view is hazy and off-kilter. But the musical score and some of the editing choices are standard, driving the plot and mood forward like a well-oiled machine.

Based on its core material, this is one of Schrader’s most accessible films, as it’s the first Schrader project in years released on a large scale, unlike, say, The Canyons, which polarized audiences as its own bizarre art-house beast. It has the veneer of a slick espionage thriller with international locations and cast (including Irène Jacob, who has a wonderful scene with Lake where the subtext is thick and pulpy). Still, I could see how it could have been more radical, how Schrader might have wanted to explore the psychology of Lake.

As mentioned, it’s Cage who makes the film so compelling despite the compromises. With one turn to the left or right his performance could have become parody—think Bad Lieutenant: Port of Call New Orleans, which is tremendous in its own right—but he finds with his director a tone that is dramatic and serious and engaging. Watching Cage navigate this character, one is reminded why, when he has good material and a sense of what to do, there are few better in the industry.