Directed by: Frank Miller
Starring: Gabriel Macht, Eva Mendes, Samuel L. Jackson, Scarlett Johanssen, Sarah Paulson
Other Actors of Note: Louis Lombardi
Plot: Down these mean streets a man must come. A hero born, murdered, and born again. When a Rookie cop named Denny Colt returns from the beyond as The Spirit, a hero whose mission is to fight against the bad forces from the shadows of Central City. The Octopus who kills anyone unfortunate enough to see his face who has other plans. He's going to wipe out the entire city. The Spirit tracks this cold hearted killer from the city's rundown warehouses, to the damp catacombs, to the windswept waterfront all the while facing a bevy of beautiful women who either want to seduce, love or kill the masked crusader. Taken from www.imdb.com.
This movie is probably one of the least anticipated films of all time. I think Eli Roth could offer to make an Austin Powers movie and people would ask for that before Frank Miller's The Spirit. I went into this movie having not even the slightest idea of what to expect.
Having taken a crash course on The Spirit the month prior to seeing the film I was with the diehard fans of the series that Frank Miller was probably going to ruin it. The problem is... he really for the most part didn't. In fact most of the stuff in this movie are the product of Will Eisner's imagination, not Frank Miller's.
Anyhow it's the story of Denny Colt a seemingly invincible vigilante who fights crime in Central City. He clashes against his mortal enemy The Octopus and his childhood love Sand Serif.
First let's get to the meat and potatoes of this review. Gabriel Macht, who did an excellent job alongside then unkown actor Colin Farrell in the bullshit Jesse James action-western "American Outlaws" as Jesse's brother Frank, is the perfect choice for Denny Colt/The Spirit but only because Terrence Hill is far too old to play the role.
Mact just seems to capture the serious yet lighthearted determination of The Spirit perfectly. The only problem with Macht's performacne is that he plays up the whole womanizing aspect of the Spirit's personality a bit much but I suppose that's the fault of the screenwriters, not the actor.
Samuel L. Jackson is found the top, went over it, and then went back and beat his previous record of over-the-top acting. His performance as The Octopus is one of the biggest flaws this movie has and it's just another bad Samuel L. Jackson role.
Scarlett Johanssen, Eva Mendez, and all the other women in this movie are good to look at but serve little other point. Even Sand Seref (Mendez) who is arguably the heroine of the movie doesn't really do much of any importance.
Louis Lombardi is particularly good as a group of clone henchmen with a high mortality rate that are actually from Frank Miller's "The Dark Knight Returns." He's very amusing throughout if nothing else for seeing the many ways they get killed.
The aesthetics were the main thing complained about with this movie as it goes with the "Sin City" visual design. I don't know why this is such a big deal, the movie is still in color and aside from The Spirit's tie and shoes looking like they've been dipped in glow-in-the-dark paint it never gets weird.
"Sin City" was a series obviously heavily inspired by the seres even if Frank Miller decided to throw in a lot of hookers and dismemberment. I mean sure the style is a bit overdone, but it's 1940s noir, what would you have it look like?
Now I am sick and tired of hearing about the complaining about this movie. Let's cover teh first problem about the Spirit being dressed in black. Yes the Spirit in the comic was blue, but he was only blue because that's how colorization worked. The Spirit was no more blue than Batman or Venom. He was blue only because it contrasted against a black background and didn't bleed as much.
Also let's address the Octopus. It would have been really inconvenient to have Samuel L. Jackson standing off-screen the entire movie holding a hand out. He's at least wearing the Octopus' trademark gloves. But Dr. Klaw is more than a gauntlet and a white cat, Wolverine doesn't wear yellow spandex, Spider-man has organic web shooters, and you can see The Octopus. Fucking live with it. Now the fact that The Ocotopus is an invincible black pimp/samurai/nazi well... that's another thing entirely.
One of Frank Miller's dumb changes is that he's taken the fact that the Spirit can take a lot more damage and heal faster than the average human due to the chemical that killed and brought him back from the dead to mean that he's apparently The fucking Crow or some shit. Also despite what people may think one of the Spirit's 3 origins in the comics did involve The Octopus being affected by the same formula as The Spirit.
Miller off course drops in the aformentioned clones, a couple of hookers, and a couple shots of Eva Mendez' ass but the cheesy lines, over-the-top noir, tedious inner-monologue, sick yet strangely PG gore, acrobatic nonsense, over-the-top fight scenes, and bizarre characters with stupid names were all Eisner's creation, not Miller's.
Though there is a scene where The Octopus and Silken Floss torture The Spirit (which includes the melting of the world's most adorable kitten) and it's more than a little strange to see a black man and a Jewish girl dressed up like Nazis and one shot of Scarlett Johanssen where the background is a giant picture of Adolph Hitler came across as particularly wrong. The entire scene is just out of fucking nowhere and the most detrimental part to the whole picture
But you know what? Miller's changes were minimal and most of what appears on screen is straight-up Will Eisner. In fact I'm of the opinion that Miller did quite a good job of bringing the character to the screen.
But then again, what do I know? I liked Alec Baldwin's "The Shadow."
In a year of excellent comic book movies, "The Spirit" comes up as a bit of a weak entry and it's not a great movie, but don't take that to mean that it's a bad movie. It's fun, tongue-in-cheek, and entertaining action-noir movie.
I give "The Spirit" a 3 out of 5. It's not great but I imagine it will be brought back to the surface as a cult-classic in a few years.
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