“Face/Off” is a thrilling action film from director John Woo (“Mission: Impossible II”, “Hard Boiled”), that manages to give us exhilarating action sequences as well as premise that is both fun and original in equal measures so it’s a real blast.

In “Face/Off”, F.B.I. counter-terrorist agent Sean Archer (John Travolta “Grease”, “Look Who’s Talking”) manages to defeat insane criminal Castor Troy (Nicolas Cage “Ghost Rider”, “The Rock”) but there’s one problem, the bad guy just left a bomb somewhere. Archer surgically swaps faces with Troy to find out where it is but then Troy wakes up from his coma and steals Archer’s face and now things get interesting.

It’s a little confusing when talking about the cast/characters section of this movie. John Travolta is okay as Archer and equally okay as Troy pretending to be Archer. Cage is absolutely fantastic as Troy and he’s pretty decent as Archer playing Troy. The meetings between the two are really fascinating due to the premise and provide some great and original conversations between the good guy and the bad guy, that I haven’t seen done before. I thought was interesting that in the closing credits, each actor is only credited for their original part rather than both. The other characters are okay but these two are where the focus clearly is.

“Face/Off” delivers typical John Woo action sequences as we get death-defying battles using guns, planes, boats, explosions and fists. I like the movie more than your average action film because of the cheesy but somehow fantastic set-up. It’s a crazy movie that gives you more than your fair serving of shootouts but also slows down for some intriguing pieces of dialog. I think “Face/Off” has just the right amount of action, just the right about of cheesiness and just the right amount heart to get itself to work. If Travolta were as good as Cage, we’d definitely have a serious winner here.