One of those guilty pleasures...

Rating: Null/10 (1 July 2008)

If ever a film looked like a cert for the thumbs down this is it. Nic Cage, an actor of limited ability with a propensity for wearing ill-fitting wigs, in an effects-heavy adaptation of a lesser-known comic-book character. Early indications gave me no reason to hope for anything better but then, after half-an-hour or so of fairly clunky exposition something strange started to happen: it started to be fun
Make no bones about it, this isn't a well made film but, like all good films that know that they're bad, it doesn't worry too much about pleasing those looking for polished performances, meaningful dialogue and semiotics. In fact, like a hairy biker gunning his engine, it raises a finger at all those with lofty expectations and goes its own delirious way. This is a film about a skeleton with its head on fire, after all.
Cage gives exactly the same performance he has given in every film he has ever made. His syrup sits atop his head like a fat lazy spider dreaming of the time it spied its soul mate perched atop Elton John's dome. Its difficult to be sure whether Cage is trying to play it straight in order to raise laughs or not  perhaps he didn't even know himself. Perhaps director Johnson told him to play it straight knowing it was a sure way of winning laughs. Either way, Cage is at his least irritating here. Eva Mendes doesn't have much to do but looks delicious doing it in a succession of tight-fitting outfits. Peter Fonda makes one of film history's more insipid Satans, while the guy who plays his errant son fares little better. Sam Elliott plays the crusty caretaker of a cemetery who appears to be based on Clint Eastwood's western characters and shares an exhilarating night-time race across the desert with the Ghost Rider to the strains of Ghost Riders in the Sky.
This is one of those films that wants you to crack open a beer, kick back, and empty your brain before the opening credits end. Watch it on its own terms and you're sure to have a blast.