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!

Ghost Rider is an adaptation of the Marvel comic book series of  the same name starring Nic Cage, Peter Fonda, Eva Mendes, Sam Elliott, and Wes Bently. It tells the story of Johnny Blaze, a stunt motorcyclist who makes a Faustian deal to save his father from cancer with the devilish Mephistopheles (Fonda) in exchange for his soul.  Years later, Johnny (Cage) is a famous motorcycle stunt rider known for his death-defying acts. But the deal he made comes back to haunt him as Mephistopheles demands that Johnny fulfill his end of the bargain and become the Ghost Rider. When night falls or evil is near, Johnny's body transforms into a blazing skeleton engulfed in hellfire, possessing supernatural powers. As the Ghost Rider, Johnny's mission is to find and defeat Blackheart (Bentley), who is now on a quest to acquire the Contract of San Venganza, a powerful document capable of granting him control over thousands of lost souls to assist him in overthrowing his father, Mephistopheles, and take over Earth. Johnny eventually takes the help of the mysterious caretaker of a local cemetery, Carter Slade (Elliott), who was once the Ghost Rider himself, and learns about his powers and everything else he needs to be effective at being the Ghost Rider. Johnny must do all of this as he tries to reconnect with an old childhood flame, Roxanne (Mendes).

The story for Ghost Rider sounds amazing on paper. The limitations it faces, however, is the fact that it was made in 2007, and rather poorly. The CGI for this movie has aged incredibly poorly. My wife, who does not consider herself particularly critical of movies like myself, was first to point out that the head of the Ghost Rider when he is first introduced is proportionately small to the rest of his frame. This particular shame of CG is highlighted later when animators fixed the issue and gave the Rider his rightly-sized skull for the latter part of the movie. The story also has quite a bit of issues; even though the consequences of Blackheart are quite dire, the quickness of Blaze to become comfortable with his powers is quite alarming - especially with his previous characterizations of being an aloof, salt of the Earth type of guy. Even the additional context that the extended cut provided, it did not do very much to assuage the concern about the speed at which the story moves. The extended cut lengthened many scenes to the point of being uncomfortable and shortened some to leave us confused as to the sequencing of the story. I believe the events of the story happen over the course of three or four days max, once the story catches up to the modern day. I would argue that Mendes' character also was unnecessary. When Blaze finds out that Roxanne is kidnapped by Blackheart in preparation for the climax of the movie, he finds the corpse of his best friend and tour manager in his studio loft. While it does provide motivation to have the "love interest" captured to defeat Blackheart, this other person he has a deeper connection to being dead would have served sufficient motivation, potentially opening up a spot in the final battle to have Slade defeat Blackheart with Johnny in an ending that the audience with me was been revved up to expect but was left disappointed. The acting performances are what you might have expected from a comic book movie at the time, very exaggerated and silly. This proved to be distracting as the three of us kept bemoaning the fact that there seemed to be very few people grounded even to the world and mythology of the movie. The breakout star of this movie remains Sam Elliot, who is a consummate professional and is able to let us get lost in the story with his character's delivery. The same can't be said of many other people in this movie besides Cage, who is able to portray the newly christened Ghost Rider as trying to keep his alter ego under control as much as he can, but fails to do so, losing himself somewhat in the process. I remember liking this movie enough as a teenager, having seen this movie twice in theaters, but time has not aged this movie very well - if not me just realizing how terrible the movie has been for 16 years. I shall review the sequel soon, as a matter of finishing the reviews for this short-lived series, so be sure to check in with me later when I do get around to the task.