Ghost Rider (2007)
Directed by Mark Steven Johnson
In order to save his dying father, young stunt cyclist Johnny Blaze sells his soul to Mephistopheles and sadly parts from the pure-hearted Roxanne Simpson, the love of his life. Years later, Johnny's path crosses again with Roxanne, now a go-getting reporter, and also with Mephistopheles, who offers to release Johnny's soul if Johnny becomes the fabled, fiery 'Ghost Rider'.
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Just possibly—certainly the bit where he imitates the skull from Disney’s 1929 The Skeleton Dance (seen earlier on TV in the movie) is meant to be funny.
Thankfully, "Ghost Rider" plays a lot of this for comedy -- at least until the special effects budget kicks in -- and Cage lets himself go loosey-goosey in a way he hasn't since, oh, "Vampire's Kiss" way back in 1989 .
It’s as if all of the talent he showed in Leaving Las Vegas and Adaptation.
Nicolas Cage, having squandered most of his goodwill from his 1995 Oscar for "Leaving Las Vegas," goes "all in" for what is likely to be the first and last entry in the "Ghost Rider" franchise, and yet a project bound for the pantheon of "good" bad movies.
This is not a stretch for the man who gave the brilliant turn in “Leaving Las Vegas.”
The screenplay is by Mark Steven Johnson—the fellow responsible for Daredevil (2003) and Elektra (2005).
Two years later he was the writer and executive producer for Elektra, which got hit by a huge critical bus.
Although he claims to be a huge comic book fanatic, filmmaker Mark Steven Johnson (Elektra, Daredevil) seems to have no good idea on how to create a quality superhero flick.
Writer-director Mark Steven Johnson was also responsible for "Daredevil" (which looked better to me in 2003 than it does in hindsight and is reviled by other comic fans), and he wrote the soporific "Elektra."
Eva Mendes and Sam Elliott fill in as love interest and mentor, respectively, and director Mark Steven Johnson improves on his last outing, Elektra, but without Cage, he’d have little more than an infernal flame-out.
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On the genuine negative side, there’s a romance between Johnny and busty TV reporter Roxanne Simpson (Eva Mendes, Hitch) that makes the one between Bruce Wayne and Vicki Vale in Batman (1989) look like one of the great love stories of our time.
He stole “American Beauty” from Kevin Spacey, Chris Cooper and Annette Bening, which is no mean feat.
Every supporting character phones it in: Eva Mendes, whose constant cleavage doesn't distract from utter vacancy as Blaze's TV reporter ex-girlfriend; Sam Elliott, who has reached his quota of narrator/grizzled-mentors and whose beard stubble almost connects with his eyebrows; Fonda, who looks zoned; and Wes Bentley ("American Beauty") wanly hamming it up as the Devil's homicidal son in raccoon eye-shadow.
On the list are Blackheart (Wes Bentley, "American Beauty") and his minions, who want to bring a whole lot of trouble to humanity.
Or why former buzzworthy actor Wes Bentley ("American Beauty") was willing to co-star as Blaze's biggest supernatural foe.
No, but it has much more going for it than the last “X-Men” sequel, in the end.
But it's a far cry from "Batman Begins," the "Spider-Man" movies and Bryan Singer's "X-Men" films, which have set the bar pretty high for everything that's followed.
But it’s not good in an often hugely entertaining way—assuming, of course, that you’re ready to accept the idea of the main character (Nicolas Cage) and the whole business of Mephistopheles (Peter Fonda) squaring off against Mephistopheles Jr. (Wes Bentley, The Four Feathers).
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Cage himself doesn't even get to return to the action glory of Con Air or The Rock in these scenes, since most of them necessitate his transforming into Ghost Rider, which in this case means stepping out for coffee while CGI dispatches the villains.
As far as comic book-inspired movies are concerned, "Ghost Rider" isn't quite as bad as "Elektra" or "The Punisher," which were certainly the worst of the recent lot.