Face/Off Academy Award for Best Picture. The "Face/Off" soundtrack was released by Hollywood Records on July 1, 1997, the week following the film's release. Several pieces of music and songs were used in the film but not included in the soundtrack. These include: Face/Off Face/Off is a 1997 American science fiction action film directed by John Woo, written by Mike Werb and Michael Colleary, and starring John Travolta and Nicolas Cage. Travolta plays an FBI agent and Cage plays a terrorist, sworn enemies who assume each other's physical appearance. The first Hollywood film in which Woo was given major creative control,
Face/Off and Best On-Screen Duo for Travolta and Cage. "Face/Off" is said to have inspired "Infernal Affairs". However, "Infernal Affairs" director Andrew Lau wanted to have a more realistic situation; instead of a physical face change, Lau wanted to have the characters swap identities. The concept of "bian lian" or "change face", a technique traditionally used in Chinese opera, may have been used here to depict the fluid and seamless morph of Chen and Lau's characters' identities between the "good" and "bad" sides. "Infernal Affairs" in turn has spawned several adaptations, notably "The Departed" directed by Martin Scorsese which won the