Review of The Spirit (1987) by Benjamin W — 18 Jun 2011

The Spirit feels like the antics of Looney Toons, but set in a dark and violent world akin to Robert Rodriguez's "Sin City". But this film is a total mess compared to Sin City, and maybe even more immature than the Looney Toons. The director of this film is Frank Miller, a comic book artist/writer who is famous as the creator of such works as "The Dark Knight Returns", "300", and "Sin City", which is mentioned above. This movie, which is his solo directorial debut, follows his collaboration with Robert Rodriguez's Sin City in both visual form and style (Minus Rodriguez). The modern revivalist film noir look to the film is brought back here, only with more color and perpetual snow instead of the Sin City rain. But the problem with this movie is it lacks the storytelling richness that Sin City has, and only utilizes style and special effects to back the film up.

The film takes place in the generic metropolis known as Central City, with the womanizer protagonist Denny Colt, AKA The Spirit. The original comic strip, created by the legendary Will Eisner, is a landmark in comic history. This film does not honor the original source material, and instead dumbs it down into a movie that is not very serious. Even if was Miller's objective to make The Spirit a more facetious film, it turns into a really empty movie filled with over the top dialogue and weird characters throughout. Like I said, there's The Spirit, a character who can't seem to stick with one girl before falling for another. Gabriel Macht, who plays the lead hero, does not seem very focused in the movie. He's not too enthusiastic and gives a rather dull performance. However, there's the antagonist, Samuel L. Jackson as the Octopus, who is the exact opposite. His performance is flamboyant and theatrical, and at some points, utterly bizarre (Nazi SS officer outfit??!). If only he could have toned down a bit and shared his energy with The Spirit to even things out, the film could have been much better.

The one thing that I really liked about the film was the role of Scarlett Johansson. Maybe I'm just a loyal fanboy of hers, but she is sexy as ever. But she's also more centralized in her performance, not too extravagant and not too forgettable either. Scarlett Johansson is a phenomenal actress (See: Lost in Translation, Vicky Cristina Barcelona), but she gets stuck with mediocre films (Hopefully her next role in Iron Man 2 will be good). Eva Mendes is so-so in the film, with a forgettable performance characterized with a peculiar fetish for all things shiny. All the other characters fall flat, to put it bluntly enough.

As for the story, it's very one-dimensional and disposable. Sand Saref (Eva Mendes), The Spirit's old teenage love comes back to Central City with a vengeance - she's after the mythical "Golden Fleece" of Hercules because she likes shiny things! At the same time, The Octopus and his accomplice Silken Floss (Scarlett Johansson), await the arrival of the blood of Hercules, which doubles as an immortality elixir. As fate would have it, the packages get mixed up (No, not by the mail), and The Spirit gets thrown into everything with a whole bunch of other minor characters, and chaos ensues.

Dazzling visuals and tons of sex appeal do not bolster this film up to the ranks of look-alike film Sin City. Almost all the characters seem to fail miserably in delivering a memorable performance, and the storyline is just a mess. Honestly, Will Eisner's magnum opus does not deserve such a wreck of a movie like this. Frank Miller, you're a comic book writer, not a film director. Though the film could have had much potential, The Spirit is instead put in the hands of a director with a delusional vision of neo-noir and slapstick comedy, resulting in one of the most oddball comic adaptations ever.