SOME comic book transfers to the big screen work, others are best left on the page. Director Mark Steven Johnson had a miss with Daredevil starring Ben Affleck and now tries again with Ghost Rider from the Marvel Comics stable.

While this movie is hardly up there with Superman, Spider-Man or even X-Men pictures, it does give Nicolas Cage the chance to play an uneasy rider and ride the range on his flaming motorcycle in a B-movie sort of way.

It's enjoyable up to a point as long as you can forgive the nonsensical plot, a surfeit of villains given little to do but snarl and Cage's ridiculous hairpiece, although the makers of the glue that keep it in place as he zooms along the highway at fast speeds deserve an award. The prologue finds fairground stunt rider Johnny Blaze, a cut-price Evel Knievel, making a pact with the devil (Peter Fonda, the original Easy Rider) to protect his loved ones. The deal involves him meeting a sticky end, then riding around as the Ghost Rider.

He's hot stuff, literally as he's on fire, a trailblazer with a scorched earth policy.

Miffed at having to do the devil's bidding, he uses his curse and his powers to help the innocent, as a bounty hunter of rogue demons.

Fonda keeps materialising from time to time to collect his devilish dues, with Bentley as a particularly nasty demon out to extinguish Ghost Rider's flames.

Mendes hangs around looking sexy, hardly able to contain herself in the skimpy costumes with which she's been provided. It's hokum but executed with just the right sense of humour that tells us the makers know this is ridiculous but just want us to sit back and have a good time.

Stars: Nicolas Cage, Eva Mendes, Wes Bentley, Sam Elliott, Donal Logue, Peter Fonda
Running time: 110 mins
Rating: Three stars