Day 31 - Ghost Rider (2007)

I made it!

It's been a long slog and sometimes a hard one, but I've done what I said I would and written about a different film every day throughout October. What better way to celebrate on the 31st, therefore, than with a good old-fashioned campfire myth?

Ghost Rider was one of the films I had in mind when I first created this blog; everybody seemed to dislike it and I could kind of see why, but that hasn't stopped me returning to it again and again over the years, nor from feeling a quick shiver of happiness whenever I notice Channel 5 are showing it on TV of an evening. A quick poll of my comic-book-movie-loving friends suggests that hardly any of them have even seen it, so if you like, you can view this particular entry as my explanation to them of why they've been missing out.

The Ghost Rider character has actually been going for a long time, on and off, first appearing in 1949 in a series of horror-themed Western tales for short-lived and abysmally-named comics house Magazine Enterprises. Back then, he was a spectral figure on the proverbial pale horse, a thousand miles away from the motorcycling, chain-wielding skeleton modern audiences know. Both versions of the character are visually beguiling, and so the movie tries to unite them in a single origin story.

The prologue explains, in live action and animation, how the Ghost Riders were the Mephistopheles' bounty hunters, and how one rider rebelled and ran away with one particular contract, believing it to be to powerful to fall into the Devil's hands. Flash forward 150 years or so, meanwhile, and we're at a carnival in Texas, watching the Amazin' Blazin' Motorcycle Stunt Show. Barton Blaze and his teenage son, Johnny, are talented performers, but Johnny's heart doesn't seem to be quite in it - his focus is firmly on pretty local girl, Roxanne. We find out subsequently that Roxanne's father is planning on sending her away, and the pair of them make plans to elope the following day.

When Johnny returns to the trailer he shares with his father, however, he finds him asleep in his recliner, and the nearby bin contains a crumpled letter informing Barton that his cancer has spread. Grief-stricken, Johnny heads out to the tent where the motorcycles are kept, and there he meets with a sinister figure who makes him an offer he can't refuse.

The good

In the early stages, at least, Ghost Rider is a proper myth - a simple story simply told that you can't help but want to believe in. I was hooked from the second Sam Elliott read the prologue, and the eventual segue into the carnival segment provides a delicious slow burn. Something awful but also sort of awesome is clearly going to happen, but the movie takes its time and lets you savour every second. There's a beautiful spookiness to it, and it suffuses pretty much the entire first half of the movie.

The performances are pretty good, too, in general. Nic Cage lends the title role a real depth and sweetness - his Johnny Blaze is a lunkhead, yes, but also a philosopher, and a showman, and a romantic. It is his love for Roxanne that drives the action, and it's easy to see why she can never entirely resist him even when his behaviour grows increasingly erratic. As Roxanne, meanwhile, Eva Mendez doesn't have that much to do but be alternately spunky and sympathetic, tasks that she pulls off with more or less equal aplomb. Also deserving of credit is Sam Elliott as the Caretaker, whose voice lends the story much of its flavour.

Of course, it's impossible to discuss a film like this without at least mentioning the visual effects. Different people are always going to have different ideas of what looks fake, but for the most part, everything seemed pretty real to me to me. I often have a problem with artificial-looking CGI fire, but nothing here looked obviously animated to the point where I was unable to suspend my disbelief. Probably the best effect, however, was the Australian landscape that stood in for Texas. It lends an aching majesty to what has to be the film's most beautiful scene, where the Rider and his nineteenth-century predecessor race through the desert, slicing it in two with a trail of red-gold flame. 

The bad

A common problem with superhero movies is that the villains are more interesting than the heroes - Batman franchise, I'm looking at you here. It's a problem because within the superhero genre at least, an audience that roots for the bad guy is an audience that's going to ultimately go away disappointed. That said, without a charismatic antagonist, a hero might as well be fighting against, I don't know, a snowdrift or something. 

As Mephistopheles, Peter Fonda does his best - an initial act of dazzling cruelty sets the tone promisingly enough - but around halfway through, we're thrown a curveball and he becomes more of a sort of gentleman thief. His replacement, Blackheart (Wes Bentley) has some nifty henchmen, but he doesn't have the charisma or the moves to offer any real sense of menace. From the moment he makes his first appearance, the movie slowly starts to sag around the seams. Two hours is a fairly substantial running time for a film like this, and the final payoff just isn't quite spectacular enough to compensate for the gradually diminishing returns.

The verdict

In the end, your enjoyment of Ghost Rider is likely to hinge on two key factors: firstly, your tolerance for Nic Cage in the sort of role he's famous for, and secondly, whether or not you think things (vehicles, people, household objects, scenery) look awesome when they're on fire. I can offer you no further guidance; it's just something you're gonna have to work out for yourselves.

This concludes my participation in the 31 days challenge, but rest assured, the blog will go on. Join me on Monday for a look back at what we've all learned.