Lets start with the arguments for yes.
He has won an academy award for best leading actor for 'Leaving Las Vegas' and surely bad actors don't win awards right? (except Razzies obviously). He has also done some emotionally competent performances in movies like 'Joe' and potentially 'Moonstruck'.
Yes he is over the top in most of his 'good' roles but in said roles it works for the character as they are normally emotionally broken in some way.
BUT
And it's a big but, he is pretty much god awful in a majority of the movies he has made, and not always the same kind of awful.
The first kind is the boring Nick Cage (as I will be referring to him from now on).
This crops up in movies such as the two 'National Treasure' features where he plays boring treasure hunter Ben Gates. His performance in these movie is highly wooden and disinterested like he can't wait to get off set and have a Big Mac or something.
Another such example of the boring Nick Cage is in 'Left Behind' (please, nobody watch that movie!) where he is Rayford Steele, a jumbo jet pilot who is flying when a catastrophic event happens yet he doesn't seem to react that badly to it, except for a forced crying sequence.
The main things these performances are lacking however is the trademark Nick Cage freak out (basically the only reason I watch a Nick Cage movie) but I will come back to this later.
The second type is crazy Nick Cage, this is where his performance is off the wall mad. So crazy it stands out like a sore thumb from the rest of the movie and showcases Cage at his worst. This normally happens when the movie is more serious in tone and the casting of Cage throws this all out of wack. A great example of this is 'The Wicker Man', a serious film turned unintentional comedy due to Cage's presence. ( I will link a video below of a Cage freak out montage)
However, there is a few times the crazy Nick Cage can work well, surprisingly.
This occurs in movies that are already insane to begin with and where his presence just heightens the ridiculousness to an even more enjoyable level. Good examples of this would be 'Face-Off' where his performance opposite Travolta is just glorious and makes the movie one of the biggest guilty pleasure titles out there.
The other example would be 'The Rock' with Sean Connery where the same thing is true. His freak outs in these movies are some of the best too (especially in Face-Off) and are insanely enjoyable.
I think the answer to this question really doesn't have a traditional answer. Clearly Nick Cage is a good actor as he has an award to prove it and some of his movies are very enjoyable made even better by his presence (the aforementioned Face-Off). Clearly Nick Cage is also a bad actor as he is terrible in a large part of his filmography (National Treasure, Left Behind to name a few).
Taking in mind these facts, I put it to you readers that, in fact, Nick 'The Cage' Cage is a multiplier.
When the movie is bad/boring to start with and Cage is introduced it gets even worse.
On the other hand if the movie is good/entertaining to start with and Cage is introduced it becomes even better!
That is the definitive answer.
Nick Cage freak out montage: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S73swRzxs8Y
My personal favorite Cage moment: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PDnW5XxjwI8
Thanks for reading guys. I decided not to do the piece on theme tunes as I decided I don't have enough musical knowledge to do so sufficiently, sorry.
-Joe
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