Reviews provided by RottenTomatoes
Jeannette Catsoulis, New York Times: Is the world ready for a flaming Nicolas Cage? Read more
Mark Rahner, Seattle Times: Every supporting character phones it in. Read more
J. R. Jones, Chicago Reader: The story doesn't arc so much as unspool like a stretch of desert highway, but the Ghost Rider is such a powerful amalgam of hot-rod iconography that this is still fairly watchable. Read more
Keith Phipps, AV Club: Any potential the film had for making pop art in a contemporary manner is drained away by the familiar demands of second-tier action blockbusters. Read more
Randy Cordova, Arizona Republic: Provides just enough pop thrills and slam-bang action to make it perfectly acceptable matinee fare. Read more
Ty Burr, Boston Globe: Ghost Rider is the kind of movie that's great stupid fun as long as someone else is buying the tickets. Read more
Owen Gleiberman, Entertainment Weekly: So much flatter than it was on the comic-book page. Read more
Terry Lawson, Detroit Free Press: You would have to be somewhere beyond deep-geek to defend Ghost Rider's unholy melding of religious mumbo-jumbo to motorcycle worship, western folklore, father-son psychology, and Elvis Lives wish fulfillment. Read more
Matt Weitz, Dallas Morning News: Neither contemptuous of its audience nor merely stupid, Ghost Rider's nonsensical histrionics are an almost perfect mirror of its comic-book source. Read more
Scott Foundas, L.A. Weekly: Not as dreadful as the studio's decision to withhold press screenings until less than 24 hours before opening day would suggest, but not especially good either. Read more
Lisa Rose, Newark Star-Ledger: It's not quite a thrill ride but it isn't a total embarrassment for Cage. It's certainly no worse than Wicker Man, which depicted the actor chasing hippie chicks in a bear suit. Read more
Jack Mathews, New York Daily News: Rarely in Hollywood have so many labored so hard with so much time and such financial resources to fill a movie screen with as vast an array of spiritual gibberish, literary poppycock and pure flummery as Mark Steven Johnson's Ghost Rider. Read more
Kyle Smith, New York Post: The movie could have been saved, though, if it had cut the puns of the kind that made us all flee Batman and Robin. Read more
Roger Moore, Orlando Sentinel: Ghost Rider is a joke -- a monumentally foolish comic book movie with lots of unintentional laughs, mixed in with the intentional ones. Read more
Peter Hartlaub, San Francisco Chronicle: Ghost Rider has everything you don't want from your superhero movie, including lack of logic, boring action scenes, bad acting in the supporting performances, a brutally slow 114-minute running time and cringe-worthy dialogue. Read more
Peter Howell, Toronto Star: ...damned if this one shouldn't make your so-bad-it's-good list... Read more
David Jenkins, Time Out: Nic Cage seems comfortable in the role of the flaming-skulled biker, but the plot holes are too deep even for his Herbie-like arachnid motorcycle to negotiate. Read more
Joshua Rothkopf, Time Out: Grand, empty gestures and loads of CGI effects can't cover up pure schlock. Even the character's iconically cool trademarks -- a flaming skull and a fiery chopper -- are reduced to Velveeta slices. No, damn you, sir. Read more
Robert Koehler, Variety: Ghost Rider would have been most fun had it been made for a dime by a Roger Corman-type outfit as a quickie Gothic adventure spinning Zane Grey, Faust and Evel Knievel. Read more
Nathan Lee, Village Voice: The blank, frenetic exhaustion of the final reel acts like a kid who tries to snap out of a candy-binge coma by snorting lines of Pixy Stix. Read more
Stephen Hunter, Washington Post: Mainly the movie's about riding a bike at the speed of sound while your head is burning. They can do anything these days, which isn't quite the same as saying they should do anything these days. Read more