Nicolas Cage deserves points just for playing David Spritz, a Chicago TV weatherman who rubs people the wrong way. His fans hurl milkshakes at him. His ex-wife (Hope Davis) despises his hairy body. His father (Michael Caine), a Pulitzer-winning author, disdains David's lack of talent and ambition. His overweight daughter (Gemmenne De La Pena) recoils from his barely disguised contempt. His son (Nicholas Hoult) hates his neglect, which transfers into a near-disastrous encounter with a pedophile counselor (Gil Bellows). Cage works hard to find traces of humanity in a man that God forgot, as do screenwriter Steven Conrad and director Gore Verbinski. But in the face of a character no one cares about, can audiences be faulted for asking: Why should we?

“Everyday People”

"Everyday People" managed to trailblaze in two different ways -- it was one of the first pop hits to deal with the subject of racial harmony, and it utilized Larry Graham's "slap" technique on the bass guitar, which would soon be copied by countless other bassists. Graham once said about his pulsating style, "I'd never done that before … that's where the freedom of creativity came in for the band, that we'd be allowed to do that." In 1978, the song's line "Different strokes for different folks" would be borrowed for the title of the hit television show Diff'rent Strokes.