"Ghost Rider" is everything that is wrong about serious movies. That's precisely the reason I love it. See, critics get so wrapped up in how everything HAS to be serious and mind numbingly relevant that they often lose track of the fact that genre filmmaking, regardless of budget, has been a part of entertainment as long (longer in fact) as pulp entertainment has been around. The cheesy quality of pulp entertainment is an essential part of the escapist fun of these types of films. Yep, all that means is that "Ghost Rider" is a guilty pleasure but a guilty pleasure made with style, craft, wit and an awareness of its very cheese factor. ***

Johnny Blaze (Matt Long) is part of a motorcycle duo that perform in a traveling carnival show. When Johnny discovers his dad has cancer, he makes a deal with the Devil (Peter Fonda) cure his dad in exchange for his soul. Johnny's dad IS cured but he dies the next day during a performance. The Devil is the ultimate flim-flam fallen angel having kept to the letter of his promise without delivering on the spirit of it. Johnny's now a loner who can't have love or a life of his own because of his debt to the Devil. When the Devil needs him, he'll call upon Johnny to be his own bounty hunter. Johnny ends up leaving his love Roxanne (Raquel Alessi) behind. ***

Time passes Johnny (Nicholas Cage) has resumed his life as a motorcycle daredevil living by his own motto "you can't live in fear" and taking bigger and bigger risks as he jumps over semis and helicopters. No matter what the risk Johnny can't die because of his deal with the Devil so it's all just showbiz to him. When Roxanne (Eve Mendes) now a reporter tries to interview Johnny for a story, they discover that they are still in love with each other. When Blackheart (Wes Bentley) the Devil's son threatens to bring about the end of the world and bring Hell to Earth, the Devil calls on Johnny to stop him by turning into the "Ghost Rider". ***

Featuring a terrific cast that are enjoying the heck out of doing a fun comic book movie, "Ghost Rider" may not be "Citizen Kane" but it never intends to be-director/writer Mark Steven Johnson ("Daredevil", "Simon Birch") goes for the gusto directing with tongue firmly in cheek but also setting up some dazzling set pieces. Sure there are holes in the plot but the film flows along so well and is so breezy one is willing to overlook the minor plot flaws. Nicholas Cage gives a performance as if he's channeling Elvis. The director and actors come up with some imaginative touches including the fact that Blaze is a Carpenters fan playing up the contradictory elements of the character. ---

Image & Sound:

A sizzling looking transfer, "Ghost Rider" looks extremely good with minimal artifacts appearing. While there are occasional soft spots in some scenes the film looks surprisingly good. *** The audio literally growls and rumbles as it pours out of the speakers in an excellent DTS and 5.1 mix. Christopher Young's score sounds terrific and the rear speakers add nice detail to the soundtrack.

There are three editions of "Ghost Rider" riding into stores. The first is a single disc edition that features the theatrical cut of the film, the second is a two disc edition with numerous extras while the third (available only at Circuit City for a limited time) includes an additional three featurettes. The the film plus two commentary tracks. The first by producer Gary Foster details everything from pre-production to shooting in Australia to some post-production fiddling by writer/director Mark Steven Johnson. ***

Johnson himself appears on another track with visual effects supervisor Kevin Mack. Johnson discusses the story he came up with based on the Marvel comic to try and compress as much of the Ghost Rider mythology into a single film without short changing it. He also details why some of the character scenes were eliminated for the theatrical cut of the film which thankfully he's been allowed to restore here as they give much needed depth, background and narrative clarity to the film. Mack concentrates more on the technical challenges of the film and interacts well with Johnson. ***

The three part documentary is very, very thorough covering all aspects of production. Entitled "Spirit of Vengeance", "Spirit of Adventure" and "Spirit of Execution" its an excellent supplement to the film. "Sin and Salvation" covers the comic book origins of "Ghost Rider" and the character's various incarnation over the decades. Featuring co-creator Roy Thomas discussing the 50's inspiration for the modern version of "Ghost Rider", we get plenty of vintage covers from the time frame. In 1968 Stan Lee wanted to revive the character approaching Thomas about recreating the character. The first revival was a failure. Combining Thomas' "Ghost Rider" with a motorcycle villain that Thomas had created, they relaunched "Ghost Rider" developing the look of the character with artist Mike Ploog. ***

We also get "Ghost Rider" animatics for the key scenes from the film. "Spider-Man 3" previews round things out on the second disc. ---

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