Great movie if you're not analyzing it to death

Rating: 7/10 (8 June 2007)

I saw this opening day. If what you're looking for is to be entertained and nothing else, this is a great movie for you! I'm not a big reader of comic books, I am familiar with most of the characters and basic story lines and enjoy most of the movies made from them.
Cage is a fan of Ghostrider. He even has a tattoo of him and it seemed like he had a genuinely good time making this movie and in my experience that always makes a movie more fun. So what if he had a hairpiece? How many movies have you seen with actors that had hair different from their's in real life?
Eva Mendes is OK, playing you're generic love interest. Wes Bentley looks and acts creepy enough, but i'll admit there are times where you're wanting more from him. This is not his fault, it's the result of an underdeveloped script. Matt Long & Raquel Alessi are wonderfully matched to the older Cage and Mendes as they look almost exactly alike. Peter Fonda as usual turns in a great performance and seemed to really be enjoying himself. Sam Elliott as always is great and Donal Logue does the best he can as "Mack" a generic & thankless role of Johnny's friend and manager.
I'll admit the script could've been better and a better story come out of it. It's not that it wasn't an interesting story, it was just a bit sloppy and sometimes weak & corny. (Johnny's mannerisms of listening to the Carpenters, eating candy, etc., this could be the way he was in the comics, but I don't know, never having read them.) It just was never convincing to me as a motorcycle riding tortured soul.
The villains also, came across as too easily defeated. Not that there were a lot of them, but for your main baddie, if you spent most of your movie hyping him up and showing what he's capable of at least give him a matched and worthy fight on the way out.
The special effects are nothing short of amazing and convincing, and are the best part. If you have the ability to sit back, relax, and allow yourself to be entertained, Ghostrider delivers. Besides, what's cooler than a motorcycle riding flaming skeleton purging evil?? 6/10