Movie Review: Ghost Rider

By Omar Mazariego

Before I get started, this review is sponsored by: The Hood! It may not be all good but at least our “hood rats” don’t shave their hair off when they’re on their daily drug binge.

Now anyone who’s read comics in the past few decades or even a devoted Method Man fan must be somewhat familiar with the story of Ghost Rider. If you don’t know, here’s a quick rundown. In an effort to save his cancer stricken father, a teenage Johnny Blaze made a pact with the devil, his soul for his father’s health. This would make him a legendary Ghost Rider, a bounty hunter for George Bu—um, Lucifer himself. But Johnny is blind to any of this, so he signs a deal that would’ve been written up by a Bad Boy Records lawyer in the mid 90’s.

Once the blood on the paper dries, the once favorite angel of God let’s Johnny know that he’ll call on his services once he needs him. So, one scene Johnny’s father is telling him he’s “As healthy as a horse” and in literally the next scene, we see Johnny’s father die in a motorcycle stunt gone wrong. This truly set the tone for the whole movie in the sense that I knew I was in for a cliché of a movie.
But in any case, once Johnny saw his father’s extra crisp body, he knew it was time to bolt town leaving behind his pain and his love. Now Con-Air is all grown up and if making a living getting his Evil Knievel on. Constantly risking his life with ridiculous motorcycle stunts that should’ve been had him sipping on margaritas with Elvis and Tupac while scratching himself, na’mean.

For years ol’ Johnny boy didn’t know whether it was his own personal motorcycle skills that helped him survive his stunts, or if it was the angel of darkness on his shoulders. All the while the devil’s son is looking to take his father’s hellish reign on earth and is searching for a legendary contract that his dear old dad never collected, due to a rogue ghost rider who broke boogie with it. “Outran the devil himself” they said. Is that really possible? So anyway, a gothic looking version of a grown-up Eddie Munster recruits three demons. One is made of water, one of wind, and the other of earth. Real corny, but whatever. So once devil boy gets wind of his son’s plan, he calls on Mr. Blaze to fulfill his end of the bargain and stop the three amigos and their leader from retrieving the lost contract and taking over the world.

Now, here are my beefs with the movie. First of all: Eva Mendez. Why does she have a career again?? Oh yeah, I’m reminded in every scene where her all her shirts just happen to be unbuttoned button-downs. This woman was riding her cleavage for screen time the same way J. Lo used her apple bottom to sit on top of the world. Her acting was more mediocre than Kevin Spacey’s Oscar performance in American Beauty (No way in HELL he was better than Denzel that year) Don’t get it twisted, she’s hot to death and yes I would do things to her that would guarantee my ticket to hell, but does that justify her having a career?

Then you have Nicolas Cage, who hasn’t had a decent movie since he was pretending to be John Travolta in ’97. This was his golden opportunity at a second life to a brand new audience. And what does he do? He lets some cleavage (average cleavage at that) and CGI (which wasn’t all that either) steal his thunder. They kept talking about how this flick cost $120 million to make. How much of that went to those hair plugs that Nicky was rocking? That wig piece alone took like 3 months off his age. Great way to spend a few mil.

At the end of the day I’d have to give Ghost Rider 2.5 Gangstas

It wasn’t pure trash, just recycled garbage. Ghost Rider was nothing more than a cliché collage. Everything was so predictable that I’m sure Nostradamus saw this movie when he was alive and didn’t even feel the need to warn people about it. I will say that it was in fact entertaining. It was one of those good bad movies. And I wouldn’t have been too mad had it not been for the dialogue in the last 5 minutes of the movie where after he saved the world (you didn’t see that coming?) Johnny told his boss, “…I’m gonna keep this curse, and use it to fight you…” Oh…My…God!!! And what was the devil’s response? “I’ll make you pay…” Jesus H. Christ!!! Who wrote this script? Jenna Bush? Well, it could’ve been worst. It could’ve been the 2007 NBA All-Star game.