Ghost Rider (2007)

Ghost Rider (2007)

 

Release Date: February 16, 2007

For the next review, Ghost Rider, the literal Hell’s Angel, blazes into action. Alas, his cinematic debut is closer to film Hell than Film Heaven, and not in a good way.

The opening narration sets up the backstory. Mephisto (Marvel Satan essentially) appoints various people across history to work for him as the Ghost Rider. 150 years prior to the film’s events, the Ghost Rider of the time was tasked with acquiring the contract of San Venganza, worth 1000 evil souls, but he keeps it for himself instead of handing it over. He doesn’t outrun the Devil as the narration claims though, Mephisto just stands there and watches him go.

Teenager Johnny Blaze and his father work as motorcycle stunt riders at the carnival, but Johnny finds out one day that his girlfriend Roxanne is moving away, and that his father is dying of cancer, which isn’t a surprise since his dad’s response to choking on cigarette smoke is more cigarettes. A desperate Johnny encounters Mephisto and sells his soul to cure his father. In a stunt that would make Calypso from Twisted Metal proud, Blaze Sr’s cancer is cured, only for him to die in a motorcycle accident almost immediately afterwards.

 

Years later, Johnny remains a successful motorcycle stunt rider, but the deal with Mephisto weighs heavily on him, with his roadie pal being particularly concerned by his interest in the occult. Johnny meets Roxanne again when she interviews him for the news before one of his jumps, but before they can reconcile, Mephisto arrives and decides to be a cockblocker. He explains that his wayward son Blackheart is trying to take over the world, possibly because he’s angry at looking like a younger, less scruffy version of Tommy Wiseau from The Room.

 Ohai Gost Raidur!

 

Instead of encouraging him to carry on, my wayward son, Mephisto decides only he can take over the world and orders Johnny to defeat Blackheart and his Clichéd Elemental Henchmen. In order for Johnny to do this, Mephisto rekindles memories of Johnny’s past life. Johnny Blaze used to go by the name Edward Malus, a policeman who burned to death inside a giant wicker man, and this memory causes Johnny to transform into Ghost Rider, he of the flaming skull. He takes his anger out on Clichéd Earth Henchman, causing extreme vandalism in the process. The next day, Johnny meets the Caretaker, who provides some valuable exposition about Carter Slade, the previous Ghost Rider, who he totally isn’t by the way, why would you even think that?

After leaving the cemetery, Johnny is arrested by Captain Dolan for extreme vandalism and murder, but he quickly escapes prison and leads the police in a chase, killing Clichéd Wind Henchman while he’s at it. Meanwhile, Blackheart visits the Caretaker and beats him up for not explaining where the Contract of San Venganza is besides Carter Slade was buried with it. “You are tearing me apart, Caretaker!” He then decides to kidnap Roxanne and go to San Venganza to wait for Ghost Rider. Having shaken off the police, Ghost Rider asks the Caretaker nicely for the Contract, who hands it over. When he said Carter Slade was buried with it, he meant that it was inside the shovel used to bury Carter Slade.

Real talk, I'm a sucker for that kind of wordplay.

The Caretaker then admits that okay, yeah, he is Carter Slade, and he and Ghost Rider go to San Venganza together on the Last Ride. On his way to San Venganza, Ghost Rider runs into Clichéd Water Henchman, who tries to drown Ghost Rider. He gets his ass kicked following the realization that Ghost Rider has magic fire that works underwater, like they have on Spongebob. Ghost Rider tries to use his Penance Stare attack on Blackheart, but it doesn’t work because Blackheart doesn’t have a soul. Blackheart then copies the end of Blade 1 by using the contract to absorb the 1000 evil souls and become more powerful… but also vulnerable to the Penance Stare X1000. Oops. I can only assume that he was suicidal. “I fed up wid dis whirl! Everyone betray me!” Mephisto arrives and gives Johnny’s soul back as a reward, but says that he wants Johnny to give up the Ghost Rider powers. Johnny accepts his soul, but tells Mephisto to shove it otherwise.

Where are they now?

Johnny Blaze travelled the world battling evil and injustice. He eventually started calling himself Big Daddy, and sired a daughter to help him fight crime.

Roxanne was ridiculed by the press when she reported about the events on the news. She later found success as a televangelist.

Blackheart was grounded for three weeks for trying to cause Hell on Earth.

Mephisto moved into reality television after his joke pitch was taken seriously and became Jersey Shore. Now you know who to blame whenever you complain that MTV doesn’t show music videos anymore.

After unsuccessfully denying his true identity, Carter Slade tried to deny that Star Trek: Into Darkness was a remake of The Wrath of Khan, and that Benedict Cumberbatch was playing Khan. Nobody believed him for a second.

Captain Dolan was fired from the force for letting Ghost Rider escape prison so easily. He begged for his job back to Chief Gooby, who started receiving daily post-it notes with “Gooby pls” scribbled on them. These attempts proved unsuccessful.

The Clichéd Elemental Henchmen formed a band, but Clichéd Water Henchman was soon replaced, with creative differences cited as the reason. Earth, Wind and Fire went on to achieve great success in the music industry.

Like Daredevil before it, the tone of Ghost Rider is inconsistent from scene to scene, switching between serious and cheesy. While there are times where the film achieves its desired effect of being cool or scary, there are others when it ends up being unintentionally funny instead. For example, the scene in which Roxanne consults a magic 8 ball in a restaurant is seemingly played straight, despite its absurdity. Having said that, the scenes that try to be funny, like Nicolas Cage watching a monkey karate chop wooden planks, are generally funny.

It can be difficult to take Nicolas Cage seriously as Ghost Rider at times thanks to his cheesy overacting, particularly when the one-liners come out. Despite that, he is endearing enough in the role that there is a charm to it nonetheless. Mephisto is the star of the show. He’s a great example of smug and confident, and it’s a shame that he doesn’t get more screen time, appearing only at the beginning and end. Roxanne and the Caretaker are the stock love interest and mentor characters and not that interesting, but they’re not bad. The weak link is Blackheart. He isn’t very threatening or intimidating at all as a villain, coming off as a bored emo teenager throwing a temper tantrum for the lulz. Until his encounter with Ghost Rider, he goes around poking defenceless people who can’t fight back to death, which makes him look like a bully, and the climax shows that he can’t compare to anyone who stands up for themselves. In the comics, Blackheart (and Mephisto for that matter) have appearances befitting of demons, which is pointed towards with Blackheart doing the occasional screamer face, but perhaps he would have posed more of a threat if he did a full transformation at some point.

 Comic Blackheart, for reference. Here he is throttling Spider-Man.

The effects are a mix of the good and not-so-good. The fire effects and the transformation of Ghost Rider’s bike between its normal and hell forms are the best, and Ghost Rider looks decent from a distance. When he’s up close however, his skull has an odd white sheen to it, as if it’s made of plastic. The best of the set pieces are Ghost Rider driving his bike up the side of a skyscraper and the Last Ride, but the latter poses a bit of a problem. It is established that Ghost Rider’s transformation happens at night in the presence of evil, but that rule is ignored for this scene in order to have two Ghost Riders at the same time. More seriously, it’s done again in the climax, which makes a big deal out of the battle taking place at dawn, undoing the transformation, except Johnny transforms back into Ghost Rider seconds later. Maybe these rules shouldn’t have been established if they weren’t going to be abided by.

Ghost Rider shares its director with Daredevil. This can be seen in the two films, as they have a similar tone and atmosphere. Unfortunately, Ghost Rider fails to improve on Daredevil. Despite its efforts, the cool concept just isn’t enough to make up for the film’s flaws.

Ever feel that you need more Tommy Wiseau in your life? It's your lucky day! Here's a soundboard for The Room's many popular quotes.

Bonus: Nicolas Cage is a huge Ghost Rider fanboy, so much so that he has a Ghost Rider tattoo on his arm, which had to be covered up for the film.

Next Time: The Webslinger goes through his goth phase.