Review: Bad Lieutenant (18)****

He watches with drugged-up wonder as the creature multiplies and responds with a crazed grin that sums up the totality of this off-the-wall police drama as Cage embarks on a bizarre odyssey across

New Orleans.

Perhaps this is what remakes should be all about: fashioning an entirely new version of a previous film that bears zero resemblance to its predecessor save for its title.

Abel Ferrara's violent and sexual 1992 original starred Harvey Keitel as an utterly corrupt and depraved detective scything his way through the underworld and finding something like redemption when he investigates the rape of a young nun.

Herzog's take on the tale is to throw away all of that. Cage's cop owes money. Not a lot. But it's enough to get him further and further into the mire.

His girlfriend (Eva Mendes) is a hooker. His fellow officers know he's bent. And he can't stop himself, lurching from one disastrous encounter to another.

He's under investigation. The Mafia are onto him. And he's in cahoots with a local gangster. Whatever happens, he's dead meat…

After all the bad films of recent vintage, Bad Lieutenant provides Cage with an opportunity that he does not waste: to deliver a performance that is beyond manic.

The entire milieu of the film – the setting has changed from New York in Ferrera's original to New Orleans – offers countless challenges, all of which the Herzog/Cage partnership embraces.

The film is also scattered with solid supporting cast members, but the focus of the picture remains Cage. After all the sub-standard dross in which he has appeared lately, Bad Lieutenant provides his rehabilitation, reminding audiences of his excellence when given a genuine character part to sink his teeth into.

The idiosyncratic nature of the film, the plot and the director has the combined effect of making Bad Lieutenant a unique movie in the annals of film noir.