71) Ghost Rider: Spirit of Vengeance (2012)

71) Ghost Rider: Spirit of Vengeance (2012) Dir: Mark Neveldine and Brian Taylor Date Released: February 17, 2012 Date Seen: February 21, 2012 Rating: 3/5

I wanted to rate this higher than I did. But generally speaking, it's not much more than a passably quirky film; low stakes will do that, I guess. Neveldine/Taylor bring a suitably wonky polish to an otherwise straightforward but unremarkable David Goyer-scripted pic. I mean, realistically, it had just enough skate-punk style and enough bratty charm to look like a flaming skull graffito on the side of a black pedo-van. 

But while Cage does get a lil Cagey, we don't get to seem him get too Cagey. And likewise, we don't get to see Neveldine/Taylor be themselves too much, either. I chuckled, didn't really get any belly laughs. But yeah, the giant flaming chainsaw and the fiery piss were both fun. 

279) Gamer (2009)

279) Gamer (2009) Dir: Mark Neveldine and Brian Taylor Date Released: September 2009 Date Seen: September 4, 2009 Rating: 2.25/5

Not sure why but for some reason Mark Neveldine and Brian Taylor significantly dialed down their signature hyper-spastic aesthetic in their new film, Gamer . They went from Crank: High Voltage, which had a lot of fun, crass humor and an ADD surplus of energy to Gamer which is a sedate, derivative, third-tier scifi actioner. In other words, they chose to put a strait jacket on themselves and in the process they lost what made them so exciting in the first place.

Gamer doesn't feel like it's got anything to say that popular scifi predecessors like The Running Man or Rollerball haven't already said before except in a more affecting and exciting way. Neveldine and Taylor seem content to just happily build on those earlier films foundations and hence don't really do much to establish why their film's world is unique. Save for a few glimpses of their vision of what a twisted, virtual reality version of The Sims might be like if players were controlling real human beings, the film has little to no innovation on its side. Its like a first draft of a script that Neveldine and Taylor not surprisingly never revised.

As long as we're assuming that the film is knowingly derivative of stuff like The Running Man, Gamer comes up as a failure. The character actors in the film, like John Leguizamo, help out a lot but action hero Gerard Butler just isn't charismatic enough to fill in Arnie's shoes, which is kind of sad considering how Neveldine and Taylor were able to make even Jason Stattham come to life in the Crank movies. 

Gamer however doesn't allow its filmmakers to fly off the handle like they could in those movies and hence deprives the viewer of some of its most potentially entertaining aspect. Rather than let Michael C. Hall, who plays the film's villain, really cut loose, they just use him in three or four scenes and then forget about him. Based on the scenes he is in however, I'm sure that if he were given more time his performance would reach the levels of camp ecstasy that Joseph Gordon-Levitt did as Cobra Commander in GI Joe. But as it is, the film just never really takes off.

107) Crank: High Voltage (2009)

107) Crank: High Voltage (2009) Dir: Mark Neveldine and Brian Taylor Date Released: April 2009 Date Seen: April 18th, 2009 Rating: 3.5/5

It's not surprising that the Crank boys gave their sequel exactly what the original needed more of--more supporting characters to help Chev "Superdepravedman" Chelios (Jason Statham) carry the burden of being the film's focus and even more depraved and offensive hyper-action. What's disappointing is that the former almost certainly detracts from the latter. While it's tempting to want to give such a spastic action-comedy more balance, that just doesn't jibe with the film's winningly infantile tone, even if it does make Crank 2 a little more bearable at times. 

The expansion of the Crank world to include several more characters is also a welcome change of pace in that it provides more fodder for obnoxious, loud and crude caricatures of L.A. as a racial melting pot that never boils. I cringed and laughed longer and louder than the first film, which is definitely an accomplishment, but that may be because I saw this film in a crowded theater and not alone on my 60-inch TV. I will say this: Crank 2 may not have me begging for a sequel like the first one did but I do look forward to more wacktacular adventures of Chev and the gang.