Bad Lieutenant: Port of Call New Orleans
2h 2m
Directed by Werner Herzog • 2009 • United States
Starring Nicolas Cage, Eva Mendes, Val Kilmer
Two of contemporary cinema’s most electrifying eccentrics, Werner Herzog and Nicolas Cage, join forces for a thoroughly unhinged pulp fever dream. Not—despite the title—a remake of or sequel to the similarly named Abel Ferrara film, Herzog’s BAD LIEUTENANT unfolds in a neon-splashed, neonoir vision of post-Katrina New Orleans where amoral, drug-addled detective Terence McDonagh (Cage at his most gloriously unrestrained) finds himself teetering on the brink of insanity as he investigates the killing of five immigrants—a mystery that ultimately takes a backseat to Herzog’s wild, hallucinatory flourishes, including an extended, unforgettable “iguana cam” interlude.