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Ghost Rider: Spirit of Vengeance
(2012)

Idris Elba as Moreau
Idris Elba as Moreau


Coming off of the rigorous acting showcases of Luther and Legacy, a supporting role in Ghost Rider: Spirit of Vengeance looked like a most curious career move for Elba. This is not necessarily because it's a comic book-based action film--after all, Thor not only boasted a terrific cast and no less than a Shakespearean director, Elba's secondary character of Heimdall had more than his share of memorable moments--but that this was one Marvel superhero sequel that just about no one was particularly clamoring to see, its big money opening weekend in 2007 followed by proportionately poisonous word-of-mouth. Unfortunately, despite the installation of energetic enfants terribles Mark Neveldine and Brian Taylor of Crank fame (infamy?) in the directors' seats, the film as a whole is only a marginal improvement over the leaden first film, with Elba providing a number of the film's few bright spots. As alcoholic lapsed French (complete with accent) priest Moreau, however dry (literally and figuratively) everything else around him might be, he brings the sense of freewheeling fun to the proceedings that Ghost Rider fans were hoping for when Neveldine/Taylor were brought aboard to direct--case in point, the rather obvious and very reasonable explanation for just exactly why Elba signed on for the project: the rather exciting curtain-raising pre-title action sequence, which not only has Moreau in a big motorcycle chase (pictured below) but flying through the air with guns blazing. Since when does an action movie second banana ever get to have the entire tone-setting opening action/stunt sequence centered entirely on him? Rarely, if ever, and those first minutes--the film's best, as it turns out--earns Elba's Moreau much good will no matter however less than satisfactory the rest of the film is.

--Michael Dequina, February 17, 2012



Idris Elba as Moreau
Idris Elba as Moreau


The Gospel (2005) Daddy's Little Girls (2007) The Reaping (2007) 28 Weeks Later (2007) American Gangster (2007)
This Christmas (2007) Prom Night (2008) RocknRolla (2008) The Unborn (2009) Obsessed (2009)
The Losers (2010) Luther (2010) Takers (2010) The Big C (2010) Legacy (2010)
Thor (2011) Luther II (2011) Ghost Rider: Spirit of Vengeance (2012) Prometheus (2012) The Pavement Psychologist (2013)
Luther III (2013) Pacific Rim (2013) Thor: The Dark World (2013) Mandela: Long Walk to Freedom


Photos courtesy Columbia Pictures
The Films of Idris Elba/text and site design © Michael Dequina
All images and multimedia files are copyright their respective copyright holders and no rights are given or implied
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