As with so many stories, it all starts with Vietnam.

In 1969, soldier Billy Thomas (Lou Ferrigno) heroically saves the life of his captain, Scott Monroe (Reb Brown).  Unfortunately, while their helicopter is taking off, Billy takes a bullet to the head.  While he survives the wound, he is left with the mind of a child.  Scott dedicates his life to taking care of Billy and, after the war, they open a bar together.  However, mobster Tony Baccola (Michael Dante) feels that Billy would be the perfect contestant for a series of fight-to-death cage matches that have been set up by Chinese gangster Tin Lum Yin (James Shigeta).  In desperate need of money, Tony kidnaps Billy and forces him to fight, telling him that it’s what Scott needs him to do.  Billy doesn’t want to fight and, when he first enters the cage, he says, “Hi, how are you?” and tries to shake his opponent’s hand.  But when his opponents try to hit Billy, he has no choice but to defend himself.  It’s up to Scott to rescue his friend.

The plot of this movie is pretty dumb but I’m not embarrassed to say that the film itself won me over.  The fights were decent but the main reason why the movie works is because of Lou Ferrigno and Reb Brown, who made their friendship and their bond feel very real.  Ferrigno was especially good in this film.  How can you not root for a guy who just wants to be everyone’s friend and who, even after his twelfth cage match, still gets upset over having to hit people?

A pure B-movie all the way, Cage also features familiar faces like Branscombe Richmond, Al Leong, and Danny Trejo.  Most of the critics may not have liked it but Ferrigno has described Cage as being his his favorite film performance and I agree.