Rating: 2.5 Pulses
Starring: Gabriel Macht, Samuel L. Jackson, Scarlett Johansson, Eva Mendes
Directed by Frank Miller
Rated PG-13
Will Eisner’s seminal ’40s comic strip “The Spirit” has finally been given the big screen treatment, and who better at the helm than Eisner’s neo-noir heir apparent Frank Miller? Well, two names come to mind actually: Robert Rodriguez or Quentin Tarantino.
The Spirit tells the story of a domino-masked crime fighter in Central City hell-bent on getting the bad guy and the broad. The bad guy is the Octopus, the costume loving madman whose invulnerability is matched only by the Spirit’s. The broad is any and every dame that gives him a second glance. The Spirit and the Octopus share a common bond that serves to propel the plot but instead unravels it: they’re both indestructible, which makes the Octopus’s goal to become a god slightly redundant and their infrequent brawls inconsequential.
Macht’s gee-golly portrayal of the Spirit, Jackson’s constantly changing wardrobe (pirate, samurai, Hitler?!) and a noncommittal visual style make for a film full of incongruities. At times, the Sin City-esque, muted look of the film enhances its noir-ish qualities, but more often than not it clashes with the surprisingly pulpy, excessively hokey dialogue. The random splashes of color (usually red) would be much better suited for a gory, R-rated picture (which this should have been) and beg to be joined by the rest of the spectrum. You can tell there’s a hyper-bright, technicolor comic strip behind the campy one-liners, and it’s being smothered by this ill-fitted and borrowed tone.
Unfortunately, Miller’s obvious love for the source material does not translate into a consistently entertaining film. He’s far better behind the pen than behind the camera. As a writer/artist he has full control over his characters and crappy acting can’t kill his words. As a director, however, he lacks the amazing ability of the aforementioned filmmakers to evoke great performances from bad actors by playing to their weaknesses, and it seems that every frame and line fall just shy of badass.
Ultimately though, Miller just bit off more than he could chew, trying to capture every weird character and bit of mythos in the world of the Spirit, sadly resulting in this mediocre mash-up.
