![]() The story is lame, the primary antagonist is a regular human schmuck (Carrigan) and he is later transformed into a somehow even less interesting and dumb looking supernatural semi-undead villain, Cage has some really weak father-figure moments with the boy, and the boring devil’s role is minimal. They also had a little fun with the concept that whatever Ghost Rider rides becomes sort of a Hellfire version of itself.īut the cons outstandingly outweigh the pros. His powers are limited on Earth, in human form, and he relies on deals to find emissaries to carry out desired tasks.įor Ghost Rider the action is good, what little there is, and the effects are A-one. Our devil just isn’t sleek, off-putting, or handsome just a lame, old school CEO-type. I prefer my devils more like the Bedazzled Elizabeth Hurley, Angel Heart’s Louis Cypher or Constantine’s Lucifer. Then there’s our cell-phone toting, business class devil (Ciarán Hinds The Woman in Black). In this, the boy and his mother are drifters who hustle their way from one meal to the next. Let’s add some cynical irony, shall we? In Stigmata and Dogma our theological keystone characters were atheists and one of them worked at an abortion clinic. Some “ancient church” will remove Blaze’s curse if he saves this boy from the devil. We meet some techno-monks and learn that some child’s fate will determine the fate of the world. We receive a nice little Cage-narrated background of why and how Johnny Blaze became “the rider.” Later, we also learn just what the Spirit of Vengeance actually is. ![]() And the Indiana Jones and Mission Impossibleseries always takes place in other countries. The Fast and the Furiousstamped their passports in Japan, Brazil, and the UK in the upcoming Fast 6 with Haywire’sGina Carano and returning Dwayne Johnson. The Karate Kid series kicked young adult butt in Japan and China. Jackie Chan and Chris Tucker saw Rush Hour traffic in China and France. Spirit of Vengeance follows the new wave franchise trend of going international with the storyline. The Van Damme-Dennis Rodman buddy action flick Double Team (1997) had them, too. I’ve seen these monks before, too, so this ridiculous concept isn’t even original. ![]() Even after we accept the existence of the supernatural Ghost Rider as a given, the super high-tech monks in minute-two had me Oh God-ing from the very start. They waste no time lacing this movie with implausibility. WHAT TO WATCH INSTEAD: Want to see someone with cool powers fighting a cool devil? Watch Constantine (2005). I never want to see or hear about this movie again. At times funny, but ultimately not worth the guilt of choosing to watch something so inane. I've been trying that for years and all I get are second-degree burns and a headache.MY CALL: So bad. At least you can make your head burst into a flaming skull at will. There are also a whole lot of not quite goofy enough gags, such as the Ghost Rider’s flaming urine (better get that looked at, Johnny!) and time squandered with his aching to be human again. There's a sage monk (Elba) who promises Johnny freedom from his hellfire alter ego if only he'll help save the world. Set in Eastern Europe (gotta love those tax incentives for Yank filmmakers), Blaze is caught up in a plot revolving around a young boy (Riordan) and his mother (Placido) who are being used as soulful kindling to jump-start the apocalypse, courtesy of the devil himself (Hinds, taking Cerebus' reins from Peter Fonda). This time out, the action is in 3-D, which amounts to a few shots of flaming motorcycle parts comin' at ya, but little else. Cage appears to find his role as this second-tier Marvel Comics antihero alternately silly, tremendously fun, and the means to a decent paycheck for not all that much work. Despite this, however, Cage's turns as hell's two-wheeling bounty hunter, Johnny Blaze (both here and in 2007's Ghost Rider), have been duds. Obviously, Cage is able to access that spark of inner madness so necessary to Neveldine and Taylor's similarly warped aesthetic. More recently, Cage allowed his inner drug-addled psychopath a welcome outing in Werner Herzog's 2009 mind-blower Bad Lieutenant: Port of Call New Orleans. But hold on – isn't Nicolas Cage the very definition of methodical actorly insanity? This is the man who ate a live (and large) cockroach while delivering a bravura performance as a wannabe vampire suffering a total mental meltdown in 1988's Vampire's Kiss. That has a lot to do with the fact that they've apparently never found an actor as game and/or unhinged as Jason Statham to anchor their temperamentally twisted visions, as Statham did in the Crank films. The directorial duo, Neveldine and Taylor, have yet to match the sheer action-splattered lunacy of their cult-classic double header, Crank and Crank: High Voltage.
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