Slumming it: John Cusack in trailer for Sci-Fi Singularity
In our ongoing slumming actors series we highlight cash grabs by Hollywood actors. This time around: John Cusack.
We’re not exactly sure where John Cusack’s career went off the rails, if we can even say it has. The actor’s heydays were undoubtedly the 80s and the 90s, with roles in movies such as Stand By Me, Say Anything, Grosse Point Blank, and Con Air. He kicked off the 2000s strong critically with High Fidelity, and ended strong with 2012, but already there were a fair amount of duds to be found.
Still, as far as we know all of his movies made it into the cinema then, which is not what’s happening now. Cusack appears to have vanished into DTV hell – along with Nicolas Cage – only escaping occasionally to appear in disappointments such as The Paperboy, Maps to the Stars, and Adult World. In fact, the sole standout of the last few years is Love and Mercy, in which Cusack plays a middle-aged version of The Beach Boys’ Brian Wilson.
We admit to having forgotten about the actor somewhat, and being baffled when we put on the trailer for Singularity. Sure, we knew Cusack was doing straight to video stuff, but we did not know he had sunk so low to show up in what looks like a cheap mix of Pacific Rim and Transformers, with a bit of Blade Runner in this as well.
It’s highly unlikely that Cusack took on more than a supporting role in Singularity, in which he plays a CEO who creates a super computer that ends up launching a worldwide attack. From the sounds and looks of it, Cusack shot a limited amount of scenes, with most – possibly – having been shot in his hotel room.
Unlike some of the other actors we discussed, Cusack is still relatively young at 51 years old. We hope he’s not planning to continue down this path, because we don’t want him to end up in gambling commercials like Lance Henriksen.
