Another Nicolas Cage film, another ‘it’s not a bad movie’ moment? Well, one would be hard pushed to claim The Weather Man for film of the year, but it does have a lot going for it nonetheless. Shot in gelid tones, it’s understated in terms of performance and plot, but once it’s over you’ll realise that there’s plenty of food for thought in this seemingly slight movie.

Cage plays a succesful weather presenter on local television. As the film opens he is awaiting a call to interview from the producers of a nationally syndicated breakfast show. Anxiously awaiting the big time. Against this backdrop, he spends the duration of the film succumbing to a series of misfortunes of quietly-biblical proportions. His father (brilliantly played by Michael Caine), a pulitzer-prize winning journalist who has never quite grasped what it is his non-meteorologist son does, discovers he has a terminal illness. His daughter, fat and bullied, seems on the brink of a Columbine style vindication. His son, attending a counselling programme for a seemingly minor flirtation with pot, is groomed for sex by his very own counsellor (played skin-crawlingly by ex Ally McBeal Gil Bellows). And, as if this wasn’t enough, his ex-wife has decided to marry a jerk.

Nothing startling, then, in the plot. The way these small dramas are handled, though, makes for an elegant, occasionally funny, and moving film. It’s commonplace to reserve the term ‘tragedy’ for serious stage plays, or at the least for films where one or more appealing characters die, but this film has the intresting and traditional element of tragedy at its core: responsibility. Cage’s character, the televisually named Dave Spritz (his family name is Spritzler), moves from stability and the expectation that his universe is about to change for the better, within a few small steps to the brink of breakdown. His question is the same one at the heart of all great tragedies – ‘what did I do to deserve this?’. And the answer is often ambiguous. It could simply be rotten luck, or the result of his flawed character interacting with the world around him.

At a tense moment, when returning his daughter to his estranged wife, Spritz finds himself stuck for words watching the back of his wife as she heads up the driveway towards a soon-to-be closed door. In an effort to recapture some intimacy, some connection, he goofily scoops up a snowball and launches it at her while calling her name. The result could have been laughter and affectionate jostling, but instead his well-intentioned snowball hits her harshly in the spectacles. Spritz or the Gods?

And of course, if we’re talking tragedy there’s always some smart-arse, be it the chorus or the fool, ready to point out your limitations. In this case it’s Caine’s character, who more than once remarks “Nothing good is easy, son”. This is the 21st century’s reckoning with the American Dream. In the land of the free you can achieve anything if you put your heart, soul, and elbow grease into it – but what of your children? The dream is not hereditary. Spritz has had success without substance, without foundation. His understanding of the weather, which one imagines should be a weather man’s job, is non-existent, yet everyone accepts that he’s good at his job. For all its muted tones and paced deliveries, this is a deeply puritanical film, and Cage is predictably good in the role of a modern day Job. While he queues to renew his license registration complete strangers demand his autograph, and chide him when he politley asks to be given a break. On a seemingly daily basis passers by throw junk food at this celebrity that seems loved and hated in equal measure. The junk food analogy is (over)stressed throughout. People love junk food for its additives, its convenience, but then complain that it isn’t nutritious. They favour Spritz’s spritely soundbites on the weather over a meteorologist, but then rage that he gets paid so well for so litte, or when he gets it wrong. The tragic hero with the flawed character is not Spritz, but America.

The Weather Man is director Gore Verbinski’s fifth major feature, and somewhat out of place in his work to date. Work that has included The Mexican, Mouse Hunt and the tremendously succesful Pirates of the Caribbean series (he’s currently filming #3 for release next year). The above films containing hefty doses of goofy though well handled humour. The humour is still there – primarily resting on Cage’s able shoulders – but as the credits roll few would be inclined to classify it as a comedy. For example, when Spritz learns that his son has been almost abused, he arrives at the family home to take control of the situation. He’s met by his ex-wife’s jerk who has usurped his role as father. Blood boiling he slaps him in the face with his glove – a ridiculous gesture that makes one laugh and shudder at the same time.

Surprisingly, given that understatement is the rule of the day for most of the film, the ending is heavy handed – though admirably refusing to bow down to a hollywood tieing up the loose ends style finish. Spritz has a monologue that makes clear the significance of the ending, hitting the viewer over the head with ‘meaning’, when it would have been preferable to leave him/her to make up their own mind. Ambiguity is the film’s strength, so it’s a real shame that it’s jettisoned in the last 3 minutes of the movie.

Another Nicolas Cage movie, another ‘not a bad movie moment’…