Ghost Rider: Spirit of Vengeance (2011) - Review

Ghost Rider: Spirit of Vengeance is a sequel to 2007's Ghost Rider, also starring Nicolas Cage. Years after the first movie, Johnny Blaze has fled to Romania to keep from hurting people with the power of the Ghost Rider. He is found by a monk, Moreau (Idris Elba), who asks him to track and keep safe a child, Danny (Fergus Riordan) from Roarke (Ciarán Hinds), the current incarnation of Mephistopheles on Earth. This requires Blaze to utilize the Ghost Rider's powers once more in order to stop Roarke's plan to use Danny as a suitable vessel to continue roaming Earth.

For better and for worse, this movie takes a completely different direction than that of its predecessor. While Ghost Rider (2007) focused on story and motivation, Spirit of Vengeance tilts the script focusing more on action elements. The camerawork and the flow of action are phrenetic and unpredictable, trying to mirror the psychological aspects of Cage's Johnny Blaze and the consequences of him shutting the Ghost Rider away for extended periods of time. This too has its benefits and negatives: the benefit is that you get to see the Ghost Rider more than in the previous movie, acting more like a vigilante anti-hero than the previous attempt to establish him as a hero, full stop. The negatives of the discordant on-screen elements is that it does speed the movie along quite a bit. By a little before halfway done, I had felt that the story was reaching its conclusions, only to find out that it had not only been 40 minutes, but there was quite a bit left in the tank. If the first half of the movie is Johnny Blaze fighting the Ghost Rider, then the second half of the movie is Johnny accepting the Ghost Rider before he gives it up for good with the help of Moreau and his eclectic band of desert monks - a group that includes Christopher Lambert as the leader of the monks. The acting of everyone involved is fun throughout the whole movie; everyone knows that the Ghost Rider is silly and goofy in practical ways of expressing it on film, and everyone just has fun with their roles. Cage has moments that still follow me to this day: when my wife told me she wanted to watch the first Ghost Rider, I left shortly afterwards to collect our mutual friend so that we could have the viewing experience we did - as mentioned in the Ghost Rider (2007) review . On my drive, the phrase, "Scratching at the door" came to mind. This was a repressed phrase from when I had seen the movie last, as Johnny Blaze threatens a low-level goon with the Ghost Rider  and delivers a rare, but well worth Cage explosion, so to speak. Idris Elba's Moreau just really has no cares in the world, despite the consequences of this mission failing, and continues to be thinking several steps ahead assuring Johnny Blaze that things will truly work out in the end while pushing him to do the things that only Blaze can do as the Ghost Rider. 

The Ghost Rider, in both of its presentations on film, has always been concerned about redemption. This manifests itself in Johnny trying to rid himself of what he sees as a curse, but Moreau trying to give Johnny hope that he is not bound by the dark forces of the demon that plagues him. The two movies, taken together, give a complete character arc for Blaze and his coming to terms with the Ghost Rider's powers as a force that can be used for good instead of evil. The introduction in the beginning of the movie serves as a way for the series to rebrand itself, losing the trappings of the previous movie by rewriting the flow of events of the origin of the anti-hero, but also writing out any remaining ties from the old movie to this one. In this way, Spirit of Vengeance acts as a reboot and sequel. If you could keep yourself from watching the previous movie, you absolutely can. However, I think that regardless of whether you skipped Ghost Rider or watched them both, there is still going to be some disappointment with the results of Spirit of Vengeance. Despite being more action-packed, lively, and deal more with the consequences of being the Ghost Rider, the movie fails to fan into flame a warmness to the series continuing. Despite being better than the previous movie, Spirit of Vengeance is best viewed with tempered expectations. 

Fire Birds (1990) - Review

Fire Birds (1990) is the Top Gun your parents told you that they have at home. Releasing four years after the famous Navy pilot movie, Fire Birds sees a group of Army pilots training to master the Apache helicopters to combat drug cartels in South America. The group of pilots is centered on Jake Preston (Cage), a crackshot young-gun ace pilot, Brad Little (Tommy Lee Jones), a distinguished pilot serving as the flight instructor to the intrepid students, and Billie Guthrie (Sean Young), Preston's love interest and army scout pilot. Each of the three get closer together as their individual training and instruction progresses toward an action-packed climax against enemy forces.

I'm not trying to be reductive by comparing the movie to Top Gun, but the similarity in story beats is almost embarrassing. Cage loses a flight partner in the opening sequence of the film, is a know-it-all pilot that is too full of himself to realize his flaws until it is almost too late, is a womanizer to someone he has to wear down, and the bad guys get taken down to an inspiring score. The review blurb on the front of the DVD case even states that you'll enjoy this movie if you enjoyed Top Gun! 

Aforementioned DVD cover

The background cast sure does act their heart out, even though most of the performances could be replaced by cardboard cutouts and achieve the same effect. Cage is not a buttoned up officer by any means, and any sign of respect that he shows comes across as boredom - even when he tries to volunteer himself in what should be a very passionate scene, he is not only stiff but emotionless. The only emotion he does show is during hyper masculine activities like, checks notes, drinking beer, wearing down a woman's resolve, and making things go boom. The only plot I enjoyed was Tommy Lee Jones's character progression: A flight instructor who is just turning 40 years old is starting to realize that his relevance is diminishing, and he isn't the best pilot in the business like he has always been told. The old versus young, student has become the master theme really worked for me. The music even fails to match the tone of the movie: until the end, the music selected is very sleepy and unenthused at times, echoing the action on screen. I can't say that this is a soulless
cash grab, because of the not so insignificant time that spanned the two pilot-themed movies, but it is a very uninspired one. There is some good in here, it just doesn't quite hit as hard as it wants without the soul and emotion behind other similar movies of its time.

Ghost Rider (2007) - Review

I wanted to get it out at the top that I watched this movie with my wife and one of our closest friends. Their involvement in the process was mentioned further down in the review, but we could not help ourselves tearing this movie apart as we watched it. We watched the extended cut, which is supposed to give more insight into the movie than the theatrical, but boy oh boy did it just make us more upset that it was dragging this flaming bag of turds on longer than it should. I don't think that it is necessary to write a short blurb warning you about what you are about to read, but this movie just about broke my resolve to see this project until the end. Don't fear! I still have gas in the tank, I just need to watch some of Cage's better movies to give me a recharge. I hope you enjoy this review!

Between Worlds (2018) - Review

Between Worlds is a 2018 supernatural thriller that focuses on Joe (Nic Cage), a degenerate, down on his luck trucker, Julie (Franka Potente), a German-born trucker who is taking care of her daughter, Billie (Penelope Mitchell), who almost died after a motorcycle accident. Julie quickly explains to Joe that she has the ability to interact with lost souls while she is in a near-death state - a state that she usually induces by having others choke her. Joe begins to deal with the trauma of losing his wife and daughter years prior with the introduction of Billie and Julie into his life, and must hold onto whatever little of his sanity remains as he and Julie independently realize that something went wrong when she went into her most recent near-death state intended to bring her daughter out of her crash-related coma.

Between Worlds is an odd duck. I was hooked from the beginning sequences of the movie, hopeful the surrealism would combat the overproduced feel. That hook left me when I checked the runtime and only 30 of the 90 minutes and knew that I had a long road ahead of me. It's easy for me, someone who has never worked in film, to sit back and give suggestions that would "make it better", but the slick production betrayed the silly/surreal vibe the creators tried to pull off - I wonder if the movie was made on film and leaned in to the grindhouse by way of Lynch nature, that I would have given it more credit than what I can now. As the product stands now, I cannot recommend that someone, even those who enjoy Nic Cage in his other stereotypical roles.

Vampire's Kiss (1988) - Review

I wanted to release an extra review today to get this out of the way. As discussed later in the review, I have had a previous failed attempt at watching this movie nearly a decade ago. It is still as rough an experience even with a sharpened resolve to give such maligned movies a chand and see them completely. I'm glad to have planned some of my movies in advance to give myself respite from bleak titles such as this. I would say, "Enjoy!", but I truly don't think that it is possible.

Mom and Dad (2017) - Review

Mom and Dad throws you into the life of the "average" suburban family: a dispassionate middle-aged father, Brent Ryan (Cage), a mother, Kendall, who wants to find her purpose in life after her children seem old enough to take care of themselves (Selma Blair), Carly, a rebellious teenage daughter (Anne Winters), and Joshua, a seemingly normal nine year old boy. Everyone seems to have their fair share of issues with one another, Brent and Kendall are in a dysfunctional marriage and hide that, or attempt to try, from their children. Brent is in the middle of his mid-life crisis with no end in sight when a parent- child rampage sweeps across the nation. Carly and her boyfriend Damon fend off the Ryan parents while protecting the young Joshua from harm's way.

There is something refreshing about never knowing what the origin of the murderous impulses plaguing the parents in the movie. All too often, movies try extremely hard to give the viewer every bit of information possible so that the confusion is brought to a minimum. The movie also gives an outlet for Cage to give the audience what they have come to expect from him over the years: his own brand of unhinged animalism that he has perfected. From the beginning of the movie, I abandoned all pretense of judging the persuasiveness of performances, but as the children mount their defense to match the intensity of their parents, it became clear that Anne Winters's Carly and Zachary Arthur's Joshua shine for their sanity in the face of parental insanity. 

Mom and Dad stays strong by focusing on a small cast of characters for the meat of the film, using the larger cast to set the stakes for the frenzied actions of Cage and Blair. It also seems to be a form of twisted wish fulfillment, from both the parent's and child's perspectives: The parents finally get a chance to act on their dark desires, regretting to have had kids in the first place and having an opportunity to correct that - while the children are finally able to defend themselves against all of the "injustices" in their lives as one is being perpetrated against them. I enjoyed the movie overall, but I'm not sure about how long it will take before coming back. I'll never outright knock a movie because of its gore, if it is thematically coherent I will judge it in that manner, but it does play into my decision to watch it anytime soon.

The Flash (2023) - Review

This is a different sort of post today. I know that by posting this on the blog already spoils the fact that Nic Cage stars in this movie in some capacity, despite marketing materials omitting the scope of his role. I wanted to give a few weeks after the release of the movie to give people opportunity to watch the movie and experience his cameo themselves. I will follow my typical format - summarizing the premise of the movie and then providing some commentary about my experience with the movie - after which I will give a more in-depth spoiler experience.

The Streaming Convenience

A few weeks ago I posted about the dying of DVD sections/bins in gas stations and how searching those became a source of entertainment for my younger self. I started to think about how the rise in popularity of streaming may have led to a decline in interest for gas stations to keep physical media for sale. I certainly have noticed that for a significant portion of my reviews to date, they have come from me watching them from various streaming services. Do I own each movie that I have reviewed? Yes. But that didn't stop me from selecting which movies I wanted to review based on how convenient it was to access the movie - even though going to my office from any point in my house is by no means inconvenient.

There was one trend that I noticed while looking for movies to watch for this blog: most of the movies that are available for streaming (with my subscribed services) were inclusive of the past 20 years of Nic Cage's career. I think I remember seeing Peggy Sue got Married and Face/Off as the only two that bucked the trend. I will have to break out my physical media soon for some of the older titles that I want to review, and that will honestly be the encouragement needed to watch some of his less mainstream work of the 1980s to mid-1990s (pre-Leaving Las Vegas). I have seen a handful of titles, such as Vampire's Kiss,  Moonstruck, Deadfall, Zandalee (though with not much attention), but I am excited to gather exposure to the early Cage, even titles where he is still credited as Coppola!

There it is, short and sweet. I wanted to follow up on some thoughts that I had expressed in last month's blog post and examine some other things that showed themselves as possible avenues of exploration. I have a few reviews scheduled for the rest of the month so far, but feel free to give me recommendations for movies that I have yet to review. I'm terrible at making decisions and if nobody stops me, I'm going to be reviewing movies in order of increasing runtime.

Dog Eat Dog (2016) - Review

Dog Eat Dog is a crime drama that focuses on a trio of ne'er-do-wells that find themselves in the middle of a high-risk kidnapping situation gone wrong in the Cleveland area. Troy (Cage), Mad Dog (Willem Defoe) and Diesel (Christopher Matthew Cook) comprise a group of ex-cons who rely on small-time underworld jobs in a world they don't recognize anymore. Every action they take is colored by their desperation to stay out of prison and their unwillingness to steer away from the lifestyle that brought them there in the first place. 

There is no one that you are rooting for in this film; the anticipation for the score to go wrong and how the three are going to get out of the situation carries the film to its disjointed conclusion. These characters are unabashedly racist, and each have their own flaws with how they interact with women - Troy is a hopeless romantic,  Mad Dog has a penchant for chasing foreign women for self gratification, and Diesel, who seems the most normal in this department yet still has prison trauma that hampers his ability to connect with other people. The opening scene with Defoe's Mad Dog is a prelude to the unhinged nature of the rest of the movie, where loyalty and trust are positioned as absolutes that shouldn't be infringed but are never guaranteed.

It's tough to pin down whether I liked this movie. I didn't mind the outlandish nature of events - it was almost enjoyable at points as a piece of parody as the movie rides the line of shock and comedy. But that is where I praise the tone, the rest of my criticism isn't as nice. As the conclusion comes into view, the movie seems to attempt to lean into that absurdity while failing to account for the themes that were so prominent. The ending forsakes anything that brought it to that point while trying to put a square peg in a round hole, trying to call back to an earlier point of dialogue. The movie never finds its footing as it wanders through mud and sinks further and further down to mediocrity despite Cage and Defoe giving it their all.