One of the first things an actor learns when it comes to playing a real person is that they can go two ways with their approach: They can either do an imitation, to look, sound, and act exactly like their subject (think Daniel Day-Lewis in Lincoln), or they can opt to do an evocation, in which the actor doesn’t try to be exactly like their subject, but instead channels characteristics which are reminiscent of them (like Tom Hanks playing Jim Lovell in Apollo 13).

We are now getting our first look at Nicholas Cage playing John Madden in the upcoming movie Madden, and it appears Cage did neither — instead opting to just be Nicholas Cage.

See, you can say that Tom Hanks is always a different version of Tom Hanks in his movies, but it works because he takes drastically different approaches. At no point in this clip does it seem like Nicholas Cage is even trying to remotely be anything like John Madden, outside of throwing a bit of mush in his mouth. While I don’t blame Cage for not wanting to try and imitate John Madden, which could become cartoonish really quickly, there’s nothing here feels like Madden at all.

Responses to the release of this teaser are dragging both Cage and the movie, and deservedly so. It’s not like I had a lot of faith in Nicholas Cage, but between David O. Russell directing (Silver Linings Playbook), and Christian Bale being in the cast — I had some faith this might actually be good. Nicholas Cage just killed all that.