Ghost Rider (2007): The Closest Cage Gets to His Namesake [Joey’s Review]
Nicolas Coppola took his stage name from Marvel character Luke Cage, one of Nic’s favorite comic book characters. I doubt he’ll ever get to play Luke Cage on screen — especially considering he’s not Luke Cage in the upcoming Netflix series — but that doesn’t mean he never got close to his Marvel namesake. Nay, he (twice) played Johnny Blaze aka GHOST RIDER!
I didn’t particularly care for this movie when I first saw it, but I genuinely loved it within the scope of #CageClub. Call it Stockholm Syndrome if you will, but I think this movie is a pretty engaging origin story, even if that’s only because it’s a story we haven’t seen told time and again, like that of Superman, Batman, or Spider-Man.
Also, Cage drinks jelly beans.
The beginning of this movie is a little overstuffed with backstory to set Johnny Blaze up on the path necessary to become Ghost Rider. I thought it worked, but Mike had more issues with this part than I did. (Listen to the podcast to learn more about our differing opinions!) Either way, we’re into Cage as Blaze 15 minutes into the movie.
There may be more CGI in this movie than in the rest of Cage’s movies up to this point combined. That’s probably a slight exaggeration, but there is a LOT here. There are 20+ minute stretches of non-stop action, where Cage is eternally bathed in CGI. But there are pacing problems here, too, with equally long stretches where there’s no action.
What’s sort of weird about the Ghost Rider franchise is that it’s almost the complete opposite of the NATIONAL TREASURE franchise, in that almost no one is back for the second iteration. We’ll be getting to NATIONAL TREASURE: BOOK OF SECRETS pretty soon, which (for the most part) brings back the whole gang. For GHOST RIDER: SPIRIT OF VENGEANCE? Just Cage.
That makes this movie kind of a standalone story in some ways. His interactions with Donal Logue and Eva Mendes and Sam Elliott are all contained solely to this movie. I don’t remember much about the sequel — aside from being disappointed that Neveldine & Taylor didn’t bring the same level of crazy that they brought to the CRANK movies — so we’ll see what the future holds there.
As far as this iteration is concerned, it’s safe to add this to the category of “#CageClub movies I love a lot more the second time around.” RomCom Cage is still my favorite Cage, but action star Cage is a close second. I’ll take him in any and every over-the-top action/adventure film he’s willing to do, and this checks all the boxes. Bring on the sequel!
How can I watch it? You’ll have to rent or buy this one. Chances are pretty good that if you’re interested in Ghost Rider/Cage/Marvel movies, you’ve seen this already. You can find this one on your own.
What’s up next? We head to my favorite movie Cage has ever been in — GRINDHOUSE! It’s not my “favorite Cage movie,” though, because he’s only on-screen for about 5 seconds. But man oh man, those seconds are glorious.
