There’s a book in this, for some enterprising person. You see, I watched Ghost Rider because I felt I had too. I’m not familiar with the Marvel comic on which it’s based, but I’d seen many references to it and knew I had to catch up. That having been said, I don’t think it’s as bad as the critics opine. First about the movie, and then the book. Johnny Blaze makes a deal with the Devil (Mephistopheles) to save his father from cancer. The big M then has his father die in a failed stunt. (Father and son are motorcycle stunt riders.) Blaze is compelled to become “the Devil’s bounty hunter.” He, like the biblical Satan, accuses evil-doers, only with his flaming skull head and super powers, he condemns said evil-doers without being evil himself. He transforms at night and Mephistopheles wants him to take out his (M’s) son, Blackheart. He ultimately does, but disses the Devil at the end.
One of the questions I have about metaphysical horror (or action/adventure) is how moviemakers have to make the fight scenes physical. Shooting a non-corporeal entity with a shotgun, or wrapping said entity with a chain, should do nothing to it. There’s no physical body to affect. That’s the difference between movies like this, or Legion, or Constantine, or any number of others, versus The Exorcist and its kin. The Exorcist portrayed an evil that was real, but non-corporeal. It took over the body of Regan, yes, but nobody was running around with guns, swords, or chains to try to take the demon down. I think that basic underlying fact is one that makes such movies falter with critics, if not at the box office (where they tend to do well). This leads to the book.
One of the main points of Holy Horror is that many people learn their religion from pop culture. That being the case, someone needs to write a book on how Hell is viewed by the average citizen. The kind of person who watches movies like Ghost Rider. Movies that have a definite idea of what Hell might be like. Most people probably have little idea what a soul in torment might be. (The rise of mental illness, however, may be changing that balance.) They imagine physical pain inflicted by nasty weapons that people use on one another. Someone should look at this idea from the perspective of what religions, such as Christianity, actually teach. I’ve got my plate pretty full with potential books, but here’s an idea free for the taking, courtesy of Ghost Rider.
