I did know that the debt thing was why he kept doing loads of action junk, so that's good to hear. I guess Renfield got passable reviews too, looked like he was gonna ham it up there too. As long as we get no more Wicker Man type debacles.
The film that Cage won his Best Actor for, Leaving Las Vegas, does not seem to be terribly discussed or watched these days. I can't really tell, I know Ebert put it in his Great Movies but he never had any problem with Cage.