Usual PG graphic novel movie

Rating: 3/10 (24 February 2007)

First of all: When I watched this movie last night (got dragged in by others), I didn't expect anything great, so thankfully I wasn't disappointed. At least I didn't have to pay anything. No story-twists. The whole flick is as predictable as a straight road through the desert. Even some lines of the dialog I could imagine before they had been spoken. Speaking of dialog I must say that some monologue is really crappy (e.g. in the end, when Mr. Whatshisname bores us with his thoughts and you already know what that leads to, but enough, I don't want to spoil). Surprises are nowhere to be found, either. If there's a small lake in the desert, you know why (if you have paid attention to the bad-guys-and-elements-thing). Bad guys. A little make-up to make them look pale, some pointy teeth, dark voices with a little hall effects, the result you get is a bunch of bad guys from hell. But no competition for the Rider, as expected. Poor CGI. I really thought we were through with the times when CGI still looked like CGI and not like real stuff. But I must stand corrected, Ghost Rider proved me wrong. Oh, I almost forgot the female protagonist. Cliché at its best. You see three women in that movie who may speak some lines. One is a reporter who asks for an interview. Her only line, but doesn't matter, she is wearing glasses. The second one is a slightly overweight girl, she has two or three lines to say. And last, but not least, the only woman allowed to stay on screen for more than one minute: Ms Mendes. No matter what she's wearing, it's buttoned shirts, buttons almost tearing, revealing enough to distract the male audience from anything else (not a pity at all, though).
So you have all you need for a nice little PG-rated graphic novel movie: a hot chick, a protagonist caught between two worlds, riding a hot motorcycle, bad guys that are easy to recognize as those, and a far too linear storyline from A to B, with annihilating one bad guy after another, but only one at a time, because there are almost two hours to cover.
Two good things about the movie: I could put my brain on Stand-By, and I didn't fall asleep.