Long ago, superstar motorcycle stunt rider Johnny Blaze made a deal with the devil to protect the ones he loved most: his father and his childhood sweetheart, Roxanne (Eva Mendes). Now, the devil has come for his due. By day, Johnny is a die-hard stunt rider... but at night, in the presence of evil, he becomes the Ghost Rider, a bounty hunter of rogue demons. Forced to do the devil's bidding, Johnny is determined to confront his fate and use his curse and powers to defend the innocent.

In 2000 when X-men came out it did a changed a lot of views about comic based movies, not only the views of the public but also of Hollywood. Before that there really had been only two successful comic book movie franchises and they had been hitched to the two biggest names in the comic world Batman and Superman. There had been a few tried and failed attempts at bringing some Marvel comics to the screen like the much swept under the rug original Fantastic Four but after both Supes and the Bat fizzled out not many Hollywood execs and studios were taking chances on comic book movies, there was movies like Blade and even Spawn but neither of these really generated that much buzz. Then came X-men and Hollywood changed forever, comic book movies found the mojo that had made both Superman and Batman box office smashes and along came a flood of comic book based movies. Spiderman managed to top X-men and every small title that could be dragged up was. And now a year doesn’t go by without us seeing at least a half a dozen comic book movies where there used to be only one every couple of years.

So why such a lead in when talking about Ghost Rider, I mean a movie should not be judged by what others have done right but the problem is Ghost Rider is one of those lesser known comic books trying to ride on the coat tales of the whole comic book phenomenon. Ten years ago this movie would have never gotten a green light and what was slated to be a summer tent pole movie of 2006 has been thrown into the desolate month of February where it will do quite well since there has been nothing of real interest released this year. The movie isn’t terrible by any means, its not truly spectacular either. Ten years ago the movie might have been heralded as one of the better movies to come out of the comic book genre but that was before we saw X-Men 2, Spiderman 2 and Sin City. Now the movie falls a little flat, just a little bit short, as you can tell that effort was put into the film but the movie just didn’t have the panache or the style to be the next great comic book movie in a graveyard littered full of them.

If they did get one thing right, and one thing that almost saves the movie it’s the special effects and the action. When the movie is in full special effects mode and in its action mode as ghost rider fights off the outcasts from hell itself the movie works, the movie is fun, the movie is entertaining. The problem is the movie couldn’t just be about the action there did need to be some story and some drama and that’s were the movie fails. The drama fails, we don’t feel Johnny Blaze’s torment like we should, we don’t truly feel his desire for lost love, we can’t see what propels him. I think if they decide to green light a sequel, that the sequel could outstrip the original by leaps and bounds as they could abandon the setup and the farce of drama and just get right into the action. This is why X-men 2 was better than X-men, this is why Spiderman 2 was better than Spiderman, once the need to setup is gone you can get right into the fun and action which are what comic book movies are supposed to be about. Ghost Rider was fun, it was good not great and a sequel might be able to be great.

Too bad they couldn’t realize what Superman did and that’s that Nicholas Cage just isn’t right for a super hero comic book movie. He has a cool style and he can be a great actor but he is just not right for the role of Johnny Blaze and doesn’t really pull it off. Then there’s Sam Elliot the narrator of the film, I am sorry guys you can’t use Elliot as a narrator, its not that he isn’t a good narrator he was a great one, it’s that we can forget his narration of the Big Lebowski and I kept waiting for him to mention the Dude. Eva Mendez had to be the worse though, she brought the movie down every time she was on screen and despite one funny scene with the wine in the restaurant I can think of a hundred actress who would have been better for the role. The movie was ok and it was fun but it was just another comic book movie in a world of Hollywood where comic movies are becoming a dime a dozen.

Grade: B-