MANILA, Philippines - Academy award winner Nicolas Cage opens 2011 with a movie where he plays a 14th century crusader tasked to put a stop on a large-scale pestilence known in history as The Black Plague.
The film is titled Season of the Witch as he and his co-star Ron Perlman (of Hellboy fame) portray the role of two knights commanded to transport to a remote abbey an accused witch (played by Claire Foy) suspected of causing the pandemic. Monks ordered the move as they promised to perform an anti-witch ritual to end the catastrophe.
Shot in Austria, Hungary and Croatia, the supernatural thriller is directed by Dominic Sena who previously did the Hugh Jackman-starrer Swordfish and Gone in 60 Seconds, another Cage movie.
Apart from Cage (Behmen) and Perlman (Felson), other interesting characters find themselves involved in a controversial mission that all points to the fate awaiting the alleged girl-witch. There is a priest (Stephen Campbell Moore), a grieving knight (Ulrich Thomsen), an itinerant swindler (Stephen Graham), and a headstrong youth (Robert Sheehan). Christopher Lee also stars as Cardinal D’Ambroise.
Clocking in at one hour and 53 minutes, Season of the Witch, written by Bragi F. Schut, is Cage dealing with the supernatural and history as his character goes home to a devastated Central Europe consumed by disease and death. The Black Plague is in record books infamous for causing the demise of 75 million people within a short four-year span.
Cage won his Oscar in 1995 for Leaving Las Vegas and starred in memorable movies like Adaptation, The National Treasure, Con Air, The Rock, Ghost Rider, World Trade Center and more recently Sorcerer’s Apprentice.
Released by Viva International Pictures and MVP Pictures, Season of the Witch opens Jan. 26 in theaters.