Misses the Mark by a Mile

Rating: 2/10 (18 February 2007)

Ghost Rider is a movie comprised entirely of missed opportunities and faulty logic. The character has outstanding potential. He is a tortured man who must deal with the demon inside him to work towards redemption. This is a great source of conflict on a personal and metaphysical scale. And though Cage does well to express Johnny Blaze's torment in the beginning of the film, by the time Ghost Rider appears the movie begins to spiral completely out of control.
The characterization screeches to a halt after this and any interaction between the hero and the villain is reduced to inane schoolyard banter: Ghost Rider: "You're going down" Blackheart: "I don't think so. Na na na poo poo." There is no wit or depth to any of the verbal interactions between the hero and the villains. Tired and pathetic lines like "you can't catch the wind" or "he wasn't so tough" seem like they were lifted from rather poor written comics. Just because Ghost Rider comes from an occasionally simplistic medium doesn't mean that the dialogue must be flat and lacking in invention.
Nor is there any logic. When the "water demon" pulls Nic Cage underwater in an attempt to drown him, Cage turns into Ghost Rider and yells, "Surprise!" and defeats the creature in a matter of seconds. I'm not quite sure how this is a surprise since Cage has been turning into Ghost Rider for the whole movie. Doing it again is hardly shocking.
The one hope that the movie could be visually stunning and have great fight scenes was dashed by the lackluster and unimaginative effects. Ghost Rider's fights with the villains were always pathetically short and lacking in punch. Stylistic action was replaced with simplicity. If Ghost Rider wraps his chain around a villain, they die. No fuss, no muss. The fight is over. There is no grand heroic slug fest that delights the viewer with explosions and senseless visual wonder. Instead we are treated to Ghost Rider throwing flaming balls of sand. Delightful. Even Fantastic Four makes this movie look beautiful.
The one fantastic point of the film was that Ghost Rider looked good. He looked really good. Hell, even Sam Elliot's western Ghost Rider looked good. All this despite the fact that the character grandly transformed, rode to the scene of the final battle, and then inexplicably left without doing much of anything. Nice plot twist.
The casting is also extremely unimpressive. Wes Bentley never manages to be more that slightly creepy as Blackheart. He is far from being an intimidating villain. He instead channels his creepy film student from American Beauty. He looks like he should be worrying about protecting his lunch money instead of gaining control of hell. Peter Fonda plays the devil, Mephisto, and also manages to remain thoroughly unimpressive despite the aid of numerous digital effects and the fact that everything gets cold when he is near.
I wish I could express all of this movie's failings and I feel the above summary of my grievances does not accurately depict the horror and anguish I felt while watching this film. I feel that the character deserves something more. I feel that he deserves epic battles, emotional turmoil, and above all some better dialogue that comes from a dictionary instead of a nursery school. If you want to see it, see it. And then perhaps you can flesh out my line of complaints.