Ghost Rider (2007 film)

Marvel began development for Ghost Rider as early as 1992 and were in discussions with potential producers to sell the rights to.[8] In 1997 Gale Anne Hurd was listed as producer, with Jonathan Hensleigh attached to write the script.[9] David S. Goyer developed a script and in May 2000 Marvel announced an agreement with Crystal Sky Entertainment to film Ghost Rider with actor Jon Voight attached as a producer.[10] Production was scheduled to start in early 2001 with a budget of $75 million and Johnny Depp expressing interest in the lead role.[11] The following August, Dimension Films joined Crystal Sky to co-finance the film, which would be directed by Stephen Norrington.[12] Producer Avi Arad approached Eric Bana on the possibility of playing Ghost Rider, but opted to cast him in Hulk instead.[13] In June 2001, actor and Ghost Rider fan Nicolas Cage entered talks to be cast into the lead role,[14] after having found out about Depp being a possibility for the role and contacted the director to express his own interest.[15] Norrington would drop out within a few months due his commitment to Tick Tock[16] and Cage eventually left the project as well. By May 2002 Columbia Pictures sought to acquire rights to Ghost Rider in turnaround from Dimension Films following their success with Spider-Man.[17] They brought Shane Salerno to rewrite Goyer's script.[18]

In April 2003, under Columbia Pictures, director Mark Steven Johnson took over the helm for Ghost Rider with Cage returning for the lead role. Johnson, rewriting Salerno's script, was set to begin production of Ghost Rider in late 2003 or early 2004.[19] but it was delayed to October 2003. Cage took a temporary leave of absence to film The Weather Man. Ghost Rider production was slated to tentatively begin in May or June 2004.[20]

Ghost Rider had again been delayed to begin in late 2004, but the lack of a workable script continued to delay production.[21] In January 2005, actor Wes Bentley was cast as the villain Blackheart, having been introduced to Johnson by Colin Farrell, who had worked with the director in Daredevil.[22] Actress Eva Mendes was also cast opposite Cage as Roxanne Simpson.[23] On February 14, 2005, Ghost Rider commenced filming in Australia at the Melbourne Docklands film studios.[24] Then in March 2005, actor Peter Fonda (who starred in Easy Rider) was cast as the villain Mephistopheles.[25] Johnson originally planned to film before an audience at the Dock lands Stadium, but instead opted to create a crowd using computer-generated imagery.[26] The director also chose to film in the motorcycle district of Melbourne.[27] By June 2005, principal photography had been completed for Ghost Rider,[28] which was set for a summer 2006 release.[29] In April 2006, the cast and crew performed last-minute reshoots in Vancouver.[30] Ghost Rider was originally scheduled to release on August 4, 2006,[31] but the date was moved three weeks earlier to July 14, 2006.[32] Sony changed the film's release date once more to February 16, 2007 to help relieve the studio's crowded 2006 calendar.[33]

Instead of a "hard drinking and smoking bad ass" Johnny Blaze, Nicolas Cage decided to give him more depth. "I'm playing him more as someone who... made this deal and he's trying to avoid confronting it, anything he can do to keep it away from him". Cage also explained that Blaze's stunt riding was a form of escape and a way to keep him connected to his deceased father, who taught him to ride. Cage rode a Buell motorcycle for Blaze's stunt cycle, and a heavily customized hardtail chopper named "Grace" which transforms into the "Hell Cycle".[34] The Hell Cycle's wheels, made of pure flames in the comics, were changed to be solid tires covered in flames in order to give the motorcycle more weight onscreen.[35]

The film's visual effects supervisor, Kevin Mack, and the visual effects team at Sony Pictures Imageworks handled the difficult task of creating computer-generated fire on a shot-by-shot basis.[36] Ghost Rider's skull flames were designed to become smaller and blue to display any emotion other than rage.[35] Kevin's Team at Imageworks also created computer-generated motorcycles, chains, water, black goo, dementors and buildings. To pull off such effects as the living morph where the hardtail chopper ("Grace") comes alive to become the "Hell Cycle" Sony enlisted teams of animators, models, effects artists, lighters & "Flame" artists. The department supervisors for these teams at Imageworks included Kevin Hudson, Brian Steiner, JD Cowels, Marco Marenghi, Joe Spadaro, Joanie Karnowski, Vincent Serritella & Patrick Witting. Patrick's team bore the brunt of the work as they created the fire using a custom pipeline that automated the set up starting with Maya animated geometry driving Maya Fluids, imported into Houdini and then rendered & composited on top of the live action plates. Patrick and his team set up the fire process and much of the front end automation was set up by Scott Palleiko and Joe Spadaro. The fire was then tweaked and manipulated to look and move believably by Patick's eleven man Houdini effects team. All of this was enabled by effects producers Daniel Kuehn and the Digital Effects Supervisor Kee-Suk 'Ken' Hahn.

The digital version of the hell cycle was modeled in detail by Kevin Hudson and based on the practical prop used in the film, it included animatable skeletal hands that came alive to wrap the gas tank during the supernatural transformation scene. The transformation scene was animated by Max Tyrie and finalized by Joe Spadaro. Each part of the "Grace" geometry had to match up and morph with a piece of geometry on the "Hell Cycle".

Ghost Rider's voice was manipulated by sound designer Dane Davis, who won an Academy Award for Sound Editing for The Matrix. Davis filtered Cage's line readings through three different kinds of animal growls that were played backwards and covered separate frequencies. Davis then amplified the dialogue through a mechanical volumizer. Director Johnson described the sound as a "deep, demonic, mechanical lion's roar".[37]

In May 2005, Sony Pictures launched the official website for Ghost Rider.[39]

The following July, the studio presented a Ghost Rider panel at Comic-Con International and screened a teaser for the audience.[35] The teaser, which did not have finalized footage of the film, eventually leaked online.[40] In the same month, Majesco Entertainment Company announced its deal with Marvel to acquire worldwide rights to produce the video game Ghost Rider for the PS2, PSP, and Game Boy Advance consoles.[41]

In December 2005, the studio presented a first glimpse of Ghost Rider in a ten-second footage piece on the official site.[42]

In April 2006, Sideshow Collectibles announced the sale of a Ghost Rider maquette based on the concept art of the film.[43]

The following May, domestic and international teaser trailers for Ghost Rider were launched at Apple.[44]

The Ghost Rider was also featured in a commercial for Jackson Hewitt Tax Services in which the character presented his income tax forms to a clerk for processing to receive a quick refund check.

Sony Pictures Home Entertainment released the film on June 12, 2007 as a single-disc Theatrical Cut HD DVD, two-disc Extended Cut DVD, Blu-ray Disc, and UMD. Special features on the Extended Cut DVD include two commentary tracks, a comic book history feature, and a making of the film featurette.[45]

Ghost Rider was commercially released in the United States on February 16, 2007. The film grossed $15,420,123 on its opening day,[46] while earning $45,388,836 for its opening weekend. The film earned $52,022,908 over the four-day President's Day weekend, with a per-theater average of $US 14,374 in 3,619 theaters.[47] The film's total earnings were $228,738,393 worldwide of which $115,802,596 was from North America.[7]

On Rotten Tomatoes, Ghost Rider has an approval rating of 26% based on reviews from 140 critics, with an average rating of 4.19/10. The site's critical consensus states: "Ghost Rider is a sour mix of morose, glum histrionics amidst jokey puns and hammy dialogue".[48] Metacritic gave the film a weighted average score of 35 out of 100 based on reviews from 20 critics.[49] Audiences polled by CinemaScore gave it a grade "B".[50]

Michael Ordoña of the Los Angeles Times[51] and Jeannette Catsoulis of the New York Times[52] expressed disappointment in the film. Ordoña said "for a comic book with a rebel spirit, the adaptation feels obediently conventional",[51] and Catsoulis said Johnny Blaze is "more funny than frightening".[52] Although Eric Alt of the Chicago Tribune praised the computer-generated effects of the film, he also criticized it, calling it a "clumsy, lifeless outing".[53]

IGN ranked the film 7th on its list of the 10 worst comic book films of the decade.[54]

The film was nominated for one Razzie Award for Nicolas Cage as Golden Raspberry Award for Worst Actor. However, the film was also nominated for Best Horror Film at the Saturn Awards.