Ghost Rider: Spirit of Vengeance (2011)

Starring: Nicolas Cage, Idris Elba, Christopher Lambert, and Ciarán Hinds
Grade: D

It has been said that you don’t need to watch the first Ghost Rider to understand Ghost Rider: Spirit of Vengeance. This is true, though this is actually due to the fact that they don’t want you to watch the first movie because it’s that much better.

Summary

In Eastern Europe, alcoholic French priest Moreau (Elba) rides his motorbike to a monastery and approaches a monk named Benedict (Anthony Head) to confirm Benedict has found “the boy”, Danny (Fergus Riordan). The news is true. The two walk and talk about the situation at hand, and Moreau doesn’t think the boy will be safe at the monastery, though Benedict argues the opposite because the place is a fortress, and they have the full resources of the Order at their disposal. Even so, the devil himself wants this child, and there is only one safe location. The Ghost Rider must take him there. Benedict disagrees and talks about how in a few days, the winter solstice will be past, with it, the hour of the prophecy. By then, the boy will be of no use to anyone. Moreau argues they’ll all be dead by then. Just then, Ray Carrigan (Johnny Whitworth) and his band of mercenaries storm the place and attack. Nadya (Violante Placido) and her son Danny try to escape before they are captured. Moreau tries to catch up to help Nadya, but she thinks he’s one of the attackers and shoots at him. Carrigan holds Benedict at gunpoint and demands to know where Nadya and Danny went, but he sees the SUV drive off and knows it’s them. He shoots and kills Benedict and goes after them. Moreau gets on his motorcycle and chases after them too, with Carrigan and his henchman right behind him. Carrigan shoots Moreau’s bike and he flies off the mountain. While in the air though, Moreau turns and shoots out Carrigan’s tire, forcing them to crash and allowing Nadya and Danny to drive off and escape.

In a narration, Johnny Blaze (Cage) talks about how he used to ride motorcycles for a living. One time, he did a bare-ass, 360 triple backflip in front of 22,000 people. Next, he talks about the events of the first Ghost Rider and how he signed his contract in blood with Mephisto (Hinds), breaking a bottle with his hand to do so, in order to save his father’s life. For the record, how it happened was a little bit different in the first Ghost Rider. Anyway, Johnny made a deal with the devil and became possessed by an ancient demon. In the presence of evil, he changes into a monster, preys on the wicked, and sucks out their souls. He’s tried to fight it and to hold it back, but the darkness inside him only gets stronger. This is why he had to run halfway across the world, and he’s still doing so to this day.

Johnny wakes up in a sweat somewhere, and Moreau barges into his home, prompting Johnny to grab and threaten him to try to figure out who he is. Moreau introduces himself and talks about how he would be dead along with his brothers if not for the intervention of God. Johnny lets go of him once he speaks of Johnny’s name, but he walks away from Moreau. Moreau empties a bottle of alcohol from a nearby table and shatters a window by throwing it through. Once the sun beams throw, Johnny gets out of the way of it, confirming to Moreau that he is in fact the Ghost Rider. As they both walk outside, Moreau points out how Johnny tried to control this sickness of his and failed, but Johnny cuts him off by choking him with a chain. Finally, Moreau gets to the point by admitting he needs his help. At the same time, he offers Johnny a chance to get back his soul. Johnny backs off and gives him a chance to talk, so Moreau puts a picture of Danny on his bike, telling Johnny to save him. Johnny doesn’t think he’s here to save people, but Moreau argues the opposite and that Danny is the reason he’s thousands of miles from home. He’s not even sure he can find him, but Moreau brings up the man Johnny signed a contract with, Roarke (AKA Mephisto). They are linked, and he needs to let the Rider follow Roarke’s stench to get to Danny. When inquiring further about Moreau’s deal, Moreau says that the church of his masters is an ancient one. They are prepared to give him the one thing he wants in this world. If he gets them Danny, they will lift his curse. Hearing this, he agrees to go through with it.

Nadya eyes some businessman at a restaurant, so he hides his wedding ring and heads over to talk to her. He wonders if she’s a gypsy, but she walks around his questioning with light flirting. All of it is a setup for Danny to come by and ask Nadya where “daddy” is, freaking out the businessman. When he gets up to leave, Danny pickpockets his wallet and ring, and Nadya and him leave. They get to the car, and Nadya makes sure he knows they won’t be doing stuff like this forever and she will give him a better life. They drive off. Carrigan and his crew were on a stakeout and saw the whole thing, driving after them. At night, Moreau drinks nearby Johnny’s place while Johnny thinks about how he’s been trying so hard to keep the Ghost Rider out. However, tonight he needs him. As Carrigan and his crew force Nadya off the road and into a wall, Johnny changes into Ghost Rider and drives off. Moreau follows. Nadya exits her car with a gun, but she’s quickly apprehended. She knows Carrigan and tells him to leave because there are people after her and Danny, but Carrigan assures her he is the person after them. The others pull Danny out of the car and beat him. Nadya tries to fight them off, but she’s thrown down too. She pleads with Carrigan, but he doesn’t care because it’s not his son. Once he points his gun to shoot her, Ghost Rider pulls up and kills a group of them while scaring the shit out of everyone else. Unfortunately, he’s still shot down by two massive guns from Carrigan and his henchman, and Danny is still kidnapped. Johnny wakes up in a hospital and tries flirting with the nurse. After that fails, he asks for more morphine or literally any other drug they have, but she refuses and leaves to tell the doctors he’s awake. Once she leaves, he steals a bunch of drugs from the nearby cabinet, gets his clothes, and discreetly leaves his room. At the same time, Nadya leaves her room after pleading with the nurses that she’s fine. They run into each other in the hallway, look at each other, and she leaves. Not having anywhere else to go, he follows her.

In the middle of nowhere, Carrigan pulls Danny out of the car in case he needs to take a piss. He calls Roarke who just pulled into town off a train. Carrigan confirms he has Danny, but he wants to change their agreement. He had no problem kidnapping the kid (something he admits to doing before for people) and he has a history with Nadya, so he was the best person for the job. However, he wants more because Ghost Rider’s presence has clearly shaken him, and he’s never faced anything like him before. Roarke has Carrigan put the phone to Danny’s ear, and he whispers a bunch of indeterminate things to him. Danny screeches and passes out. He then tells Carrigan to think of Danny as a computer. With this in mind, he just uploaded a program of sorts, a firewall that will stop Ghost Rider from sensing or tracking him. Of course, he still might be able to find Carrigan himself, so Roarke suggests he keep moving. Exiting the clinic, Johnny chases after Nadya who’s in the parking lot trying to steal a car. Once he gets to the lot, she appears and points a gun at him and demands to know who sent him to find her. He stresses the importance of Danny and how they need to find him. If they don’t, he’s screwed too. To show her where he’s at, he grabs her hand and puts the gun to his forehead and dares her to do it if she’s going to because he has nothing else to live for if he doesn’t break the curse. Realizing he’s cool, she asks if he can track Danny like he did before, but he can’t sense him like he did. He knows Danny isn’t dead, which she immediately thinks. He’s just blocked from him. Looking into her eyes, Johnny sees Nadya knows something, so they join forces and hit the road. In the truck they steal, Johnny takes some pain pills while asking details surrounding Nadya and her ex-boyfriend Carrigan, the source of all their troubles. Nadya describes Carrigan as a gunrunner, drug dealer, and mercenary. Apparently, she didn’t see any of that. She just saw a ticket out, though she assures him that Danny is not Carrigan’s son.

This leads to her scruff with the devil.

She jumped out of a third-story window to escape Carrigan. However, she was on her deathbed, choking on her own blood. Roarke showed up just in time to save her life. Unfortunately, what he asked for in return was a son. That’s right. She is the devil’s baby mama, as Johnny eloquently puts it.

Now, it makes sense as to why Moreau wants Danny. After Johnny mentions him, Nadya realizes she was wrong about Moreau when he was trying to help them in the opening. She knows of a man who does Carrigan’s dirty work for him, so she drives them over there to find out Carrigan’s location. On the way, Johnny narrates again. Why does the devil take human form anyway? He doesn’t know, and it’s possible the devil doesn’t know either. The positive is that he’s weak on Earth. His powers are limited, and he needs emissaries to do his dirty work. So, he finds them or makes them using his greatest power: the deal. Meanwhile, Danny attempts an escape by forcing the driver to crash while putting on his seatbelt. He escapes the vehicle momentarily, but so does Carrigan and his main henchman. After that vehicle explodes with one henchman in it, Carrigan catches Danny after Danny hurts his ankle. Then, they steal a young couple’s van right after and continue on their trek. Despite this, Johnny and Nadya are in hot pursuit. Though the odds are against them, there is still hope because of the devil’s limitations. Plus, the Ghost Rider is still within Johnny, at least for now.

My Thoughts:

The difference between Ghost Rider: Spirit of Vengeance and Ghost Rider is night and day. Completely different philosophies from direction to performance to general content, the two movies of this series are so far off from each other that it’s shocking. To give you an idea of what you’re walking into, the first film is one that can comfortably call Earth home. In comparison, Ghost Rider: Spirit of Vengeance is a sequel that spirals directly into the sun and explodes. That is how far apart these two movies are. If someone is watching the two back-to-back, a feeling of complete bewilderment is a guarantee. It’s as if the follow-up to The Godfather was Dude, Where’s My Car? instead of The Godfather Part II. The only connection is star Nicolas Cage, but even his performance is vastly different from what he did in the first movie.

Usually when a superhero movie gets a sequel, the budget gets bigger, some fan favorite characters are brought back alongside new ones, and the stakes are huge, among other things. With this sequel however, the budget was slashed in half, no one was brought back, the past was barely acknowledged, and the gravity of the situation is never fully realized because of so many other botched aspects of the production. It’s a total misfire, with its biggest attribute being how off-the-wall and unexpected it is, though this isn’t the pro it sounds like. Anyone who enjoyed its predecessor and was happy to see a sequel come to light will undoubtedly be turned off by this oddball production. It starts with the budget. Now, you can get away with a smaller budget if all the pieces of the pie know what they’re doing. If you have more of a grounded story focused on performance rather than outlandish set pieces and the like while brutal action is thrown in the middle to intensify things, it can work. Nonetheless, it is crucial for the director and story to coincide with this. Unfortunately, they got the idiots from Crank, and they decided to make the second big screen Ghost Rider adaptation look like a direct-to-video action movie rather than a superhero sequel of epic proportions dealing with an antihero suffering from existential dread. Truth be told, if any superhero character were to be taken in the batshit direction that Mark Neveldine and Brian Taylor strive for, Ghost Rider would be a pretty good candidate. Nevertheless, the low budget is too noticeable considering how seamless the CGI was in the first movie four years prior, the shaky camera work and high-definition look is too jarring, and all the other details to intensify the look of the film are too distracting for the plot to overcome. In their defense, Neveldine and Taylor’s style fits the high energy concept of the Crank franchise. There, it’s innovative and it’s insanely fun, but it’s a style that does not work for a majority of screenplays, as evidenced by the duo’s lack of work since they dipped their toes into the Marvel Universe.

This story in particular is one that doesn’t warrant their delirious style of filmmaking.

Shifting from what the audience was used to in the first mainstream Ghost Rider to such a stark contrast in this low-budget sequel was the proverbial nail in the coffin. It basically asks the audience to question, “What the fuck is this?”. The action is nowhere near as intense as this frenetic method of direction would suggest, other than the sequence in which Ghost Rider takes control of a mining machine and attacks Carrigan’s men in what looks to be a video game cutscene. If anything, the focus being on Johnny’s internal struggle in the midst of this mission seems to fit more of a subtle approach from a direction standpoint. Then again, considering where we last saw Johnny Blaze at the end of Ghost Rider, it doesn’t make sense to scale down from a story perspective. If anything, Johnny’s adventures would become massive. He told Mephistopheles himself that he was going to use this curse against him and would be there anytime innocent blood is spilt, referring to himself as a “spirit of vengeance, fighting fire with fire”. Johnny didn’t want anyone else carrying the curse or making the deal, which is why he heroically decided to bear the cross of being cursed forever, so others wouldn’t give up their souls to help Mephisto. With this, he became a marked man, as Mephisto’s last words were him telling Johnny he will pay for this. If this is a sequel, this payback is essentially set in stone. If you combine this with his promise to fight for the innocent any chance he gets before waiting for the devil himself to return, the story idea for Spirit of Vengeance isn’t a logical continuation of the series. At the very least, some backstory should be given to tell the fans what happened, so we can bridge the gap between both movies. Now, screenwriter David S. Goyer has said in interviews that this sequel takes place eight years after the events of Ghost Rider. This is just the beginning of the issues with Spirit of Vengeance. First of all, this rather crucial part of the story is never said in the film. For all we know, it takes place four years after the first movie because the first film came out in 2007. How else is the viewer to know?

How is the audience supposed to know the story begins in Romania when the caption to open the film says, “Eastern Europe”? Why wouldn’t it just say Romania? These are two MAJOR plot points that set the stage for what’s happening, but the movie neglects to tell the audience this for whatever reason. I only found out about it because of the research I did after the film was over. Nevertheless, I’m a fan, so I can get past this. I can come to grips with the different direction they want to take the character, despite it being a complete detraction from where we left him last. As long as the story makes sense of it all and it’s entertaining enough, I’ll buy in for the sake of buying in. If the movie takes place eight years later, maybe that’s their reasoning for Cage going back to his normal haircut instead of the distinct hairstyle he had in the first movie. Then again, it’s more than likely that it’s Nicolas Cage just being Nicolas Cage instead, as his performance is nowhere near the subdued and awkward Johnny with internalized trauma that he showcased in the film’s predecessor. Spirit of Vengeance was basically Johnny Blaze evolving into Nicolas Cage himself, with Cage’s performance coinciding with his increasingly bizarre and entertaining approaches to virtually all of the characters he played in the 2010s. He even drops the southern accent that Johnny Blaze had before. Though I agree that Cage should have done this from the start, the lack of continuity does bother me as a fan. Once you do it in the first film, you’re locked in at that point. Ignoring it completely without reasoning or acknowledgement is disrespectful to other fans of the first movie and the foundation they built. At the very least, he could’ve mentioned something about his past and how he phased his accent out over the years once he went into hiding, which would also confirm the “Eight years later” timeline the screenwriter apparently was going for, though even this would be hard to explain because he lives alone in Romania. So, Johnny coming out and sounding like Nicolas Cage’s distinct way of speaking out of nowhere doesn’t make any sense either.

Do you see how important continuity is in a franchise? Again, it just comes off as a lack of respect to what was already established in the previous, much better, albeit imperfect, film. More importantly, Johnny himself is a completely different person. Now, he doesn’t want the curse at all. After all this time, he doesn’t want to be the Ghost Rider. He fights to keep it inside him and he’s only taking this job to help rid himself of this curse, despite us knowing damn well that he was given the option at the end of the first movie to do exactly that and he refused on account of accepting his responsibility as a hero. This flipflopping of the hero’s personal philosophy is something that cannot be ignored for even the most easygoing fan because it was such a fundamental aspect to the arc of the main character and kind of the whole fucking point to the first movie. Either through conversation or internal dialogue, something needed to be given to the audience as to why he wants to give up everything after all these years. The only insight the viewer is given is Moreau antagonizing Johnny upon their first meeting by asking him, “You thought you could control it. Make it work for you, huh?”. This is something, but it needs to be delved into more to show his internal struggle. For the most part, it’s more of a physical thing and the screenplay doesn’t allow for Johnny to clarify the battle between being a hero to those in need and being the Ghost Rider. Some have said that he has been corrupted because of all the evil souls he’s taken down, which is why his skeleton is black when the Ghost Rider appears, but if this is true, a pivotal detail like this needs to be relayed to the mainstream viewing audience to appreciate the evolution of Johnny in this sequel. The continuity issues don’t stop there either. The backstory, which the first movie spends a good portion of the first act depicting and is now a part of the character’s lore within film, is explained in a fast-paced, animated, graphic novel-like design to remind the audience of what happened previously in an amusing way.

The problem is that it isn’t funny and it’s not really what happened. It’s kind of what happened, but it’s more or less another insult because it tries to change the history of the character when we know what happened, as the whole first movie was centered around it. In that film, Johnny accidentally signs the contract with blood after nicking his hand on it, while reading it calmly. When Johnny retells the story in Spirit of Vengeance, he’s on his knees in despair, crushes a glass bottle purposely, and signs it in blood to make it official. This is a HUGE difference. On top of that, he’s now calling the devil “Roarke”. Where in the fuck did this come from? In Ghost Rider, everyone was calling him Mephistopheles. Now, he’s suddenly Roarke and an entirely different actor plays him? I understand scheduling conflicts could lead to Ciarán Hinds getting the job over Peter Fonda, but Fonda wanted to return. He just wasn’t given the option. Why? Fonda’s Mehpisto coming back to enact revenge on the guy who decided to damn his soul for an eternity just to make sure Mephisto couldn’t pull the same shit is a logical continuation of the story. Now, they want the same character to have a different name, a different actor to play him, AND he doesn’t bring up any of the past disagreements he had with the main character? How the hell is this the same person then? Even in the world-building of this sequel, they make it clear he’s still the devil, so he is in fact the same person. So, why wouldn’t he go after Ghost Rider then? The devil doesn’t just let things go. Matt Long who played the younger Johnny in the crucial opening sequence that started the series was replaced too, despite him originally set to return. No real-life explanation was given for him being replaced either. Though they did film things in a way where Long’s absence wasn’t too noticeable, Ciarán Hinds playing the devil instead of Peter Fonda and being referred to by a completely different name, even though he’s technically the same person, is absolute nonsense and a complete slap in the face.

At this point, why not just make it an entirely different movie and recast Ghost Rider? If you just disregarded everything in the origin story, what the fuck are you doing? Were you actually surprised people weren’t receptive to this? David S. Goyer is quoted as saying that Spirit of Vengeance “doesn’t contradict anything that happened in the first film”, but that’s a complete fucking lie. They retell the origin in a different way, change pivotal characters, and disregard a majority of what worked or was important in telling the story of the first movie.

Just like Crank, Ghost Rider: Spirit of Vengeance runs at a breakneck pace and is nonstop to the finish line. It takes a while to get used to, but once you settle in, there are moments of fun like Johnny hearing Nadya’s backstory with the characters involved and him accepting it without sympathy whatsoever because he’s seen it all (“Sure, okay”) and asks a few more questions to get the fully realized idea of what’s happening, leading him to hilariously saying in a deadpan manner, “You’re the devil’s baby mama”. Him downing a bunch of prescription pills in the middle of it just added to the frenzy onscreen. When they’re in that underground club to meet Carrigan’s friend Vasil and Nadya wonders if she’s going to regret taking Johnny, he takes a few more pills and responds humorously, “Um, yeah, probably”. Despite having so many problems with how Johnny is portrayed in this sequel from how its written to the performance, I still have to admit I was entertained by Cage’s antics. Again, he’s not Johnny Blaze in this sequel. He’s purely Nicolas Cage. This includes when he’s interrogating Vasil like he’s tweaking on crack, even though he’s really trying to stop himself from transitioning into Ghost Rider. Black holes pop in and out of where his eyes are, and he starts laughing like a maniac to the point where he screams, “You will tell me, or I will eat your stinking soul!”. With a smile on my face, I still said to myself, “This is peak Cage”. If you’re able to let go of what you want the movie to be at this point, there are elements that you do start to appreciate. The biggest example of this are the absolutely METAL closeups of a mid-morph Cage screaming on the Hellcycle at hundreds of miles an hour on some video game vibes while painfully turning into Ghost Rider. The imagery in these sequences is the only thing I felt would’ve improved the first film’s direction. Going along with this, I did like the realistic movements of the Ghost Rider this time around and his appearances are filmed much better like when he turns his head or teeters back and forth before sprinting at his opponent at full speed. Finally, the essence of Ghost Rider’s violent and unpredictable aura is captured, fitting of the unparalleled badass that he is.

Its moments like after Carrigan shoots him down with the javelin rocket launcher before the Rider is seen standing with his chain and accompanied by that guitar riff that we live for as fans of the comic book star. Along with his black skull appearance, Ghost Rider looks a lot more intimidating with the way he’s framed onscreen, and it’s a great choice. They take their time with his movements and reactions to show you how scary he can be to other people, and it’s done very well. This is another thing the first film should have taken advantage of. With this being said, the realistic look of the new Hellcycle that seemed to go completely against the comic book look of the first movie was bland, as was the straight black leather costume. It was nowhere near the ultra-cool attire the superhero donned originally. A realistic approach isn’t a bad idea, but not everything needed to be changed. The bike and the costume were two of the best parts of Ghost Rider! Don’t get rid of it!

For an original character, Idris Elba’s Moreau was a welcomed addition to the franchise. The fearless drunk is a lot of fun, and Elba’s chemistry with Cage was more entertaining that I thought it would be. His clarification surrounding angel Zarathos being the Spirit of Justice who was to protect the world of men before being tricked, captured, and brought down to hell until he “was driven insane” was an excellent way to speak of the mythos behind the Rider. The viewer starts to make the connection as he talks about how Zarathos’s mission to protect the innocent was perverted into punishing the guilty, become the “Spirit of Vengeance” as a result. When you’re expecting Johnny to say the angel or Spirit of Justice is inside of him to stop the de-cursing process and he doesn’t, the foreshadowing is obvious but desired. I just wish they delivered it in a much more satisfying way than that final conversation, as Cage still looked like he was in the middle of a manic episode. The blue flames were a nice touch though.

Another inconsistency other than Ghost Rider riding in the daylight, which he 100% could not do in the first movie (but it gets a pass because the ending chase sequence was pretty cool looking), is Johnny speaking of the Ghost Rider as if he’s The Wolfman. He talks about how when the Rider takes over, “There’s no reason, no conscience, just hunger”. This line is moronic. If that was the case, then Ghost Rider wouldn’t be a superhero. He’s out to stop evil at all costs and is motivated by the sight of bad souls. It’s the whole point of the character. Now, it’s just an entity that has no reasoning? For the record, he tells Nadya that she needs to be weary of the Rider when he appears because she will be no different from Carrigan in his eyes because of her criminal past and he might attack her, which would give the Rider reasoning and a directive. However, this is a direct contradiction to what he says before that, so which is it? Kurt Russell lookalike Johnny Whitworth was okay, but his transformation into Blackout made him look like Wallow from the first movie mixed with a Matrix character. After he was given the same power Blackheart had, he didn’t offer the movie anything different or interesting as a villain, though him being able to eat a Twinkie without an issue after everything else decayed in his hand was a great gag. Along with Christopher Lambert’s weirdo monk role, the pseudo father/son relationship between Johnny and Danny was a good idea but was underutilized. The only scene where we saw the potential was in the amusing diner scene when Johnny relaxes around him once Danny tells him he’s much cooler than the other men Nadya hangs around after he tries hard to befriend him.

Speaking of which, the humor is hit-or-miss. You can’t help but laugh when Cage nods “What’s up” to a bald and tattooed from head-to-toe Lambert or when Johnny speaks of the different forms the devil takes and Jerry Springer is flashed across the screen, but at the same time you groan when we go back to the joke of Ghost Rider taking a piss twice just to say the stream looks like a flamethrower. Additionally, I don’t know where the humor was in the random cutaway involving Moreau inexplicably upside down in a tree either. Also, I’m not sure if it was supposed to be humorous but saying that Uzak Gokten, Turkey is the farthest place from Heaven and will be the sight of the ritual because of it was kind of funny too. The pivotal scene where Johnny rids himself of the curse is passed off as an artistic choice, but it came off more like a budgetary decision. Going back to feeling like a video game, the CGI body of the Ghost Rider is shown amidst a pure white background, and the black skull pukes out a chain, and it’s just ugly to watch unfold. Giving Cage the reigns to have a full mental breakdown with a flashing of different lenses and colors across the screen would have been a much better way to go. For a major Hollywood production, the direction they went in felt dirty and cheap. The same could be said for the cult ritual in the amphitheater as it’s been done countless times before by much better productions. Thankfully, the final chase sequence made up for it, as Ghost Rider’s battle with Blackout on the car (“Roadkill”) and him launching Roarke to Hell (“Worst fucking deal I ever made”) was a much better finale than the first movie’s underwhelming fight with Legion and standoff with Mephisto. At least they learned their lesson there. Even so, the question remains as to how in the blue hell Danny survived that devastating car crash without a scratch on him. If the argument revolves around his powers, then technically he was never in any danger at all, right? This lone moment contradicts the entire plot.

Despite its earned final grade, Ghost Rider: Spirit of Vengeance still has entertainment value because it missed the mark on such a wildly epic scale that it deserves to be seen. Simply put, it shot for the moon and ended up on the rings of Saturn. It’s off-the-wall in a bad way, it’s noticeably cheap, it’s sometimes hard to look at because of how it’s directed, it completely disrespects its predecessor, and its plot is bafflingly unoriginal for an IP that is one of the more unique comic books to exist.