|
 The
Spirit
Starring: Gabriel Macht, Samuel L. Jackson, Eva
Mendes, Scarlett Johansson
Directed by: Frank Miller
This title will be released on April 14, 2009.
Pre-order
nowand save!
Oh
dear. This started off so remarkably bad. Being a “fan”
of Frank Miller I stuck around. Eh, in hind sight that old adage
about first impressions should be well respected.
Miller,
who directs, is an honored graphic novel king. However, half way
through this debacle his directorial errors are obvious. Miller
handles The Spirit a tad too literal to make it completely
enjoyable. Film is a different medium. And while die-hard novel
enthusiasts will always gripe, you need only experience Sin
City, to see how melding mediums can be done. Plus the script
is pure tween-without-a-clue mid-term ivy-league film campish
and often plain old painful to the auditory system.
Story
goes… The Spirit (Gabriel Macht) is after Octopus (Samuel
L. Jackson). The Spirit’s beloved city is being tormented
by the indestructible villain. A villain who – naturally
– wants to rule the world.
Also
this bad-ass Octopus seems to know something about The Spirit.
See the hero is very confused. He died yet he walks. He yearns
to know why death has escaped him.
There’s
half a dozen weird left field tie ins running around the green
screen. And Miller has added these super annoying flashes of an
angel of death or something that follows The Spirit.
After
a horrendous opening (bare with it) admittedly the story gets
a bit - in graphic novel depth – better. But better is what
one settles when determined not to be upset about the money laid
down for mediocre.
The
yarn predictably veers off into past loves and future maybes.
And, to be fair, there are a coupleof utterly humorous scenes.
However, even those are mucked up by sophomoric lines dealt by
a juvenile hand. Yech.
Gabriel
Macht, as The Spirit, is pretty good at playing the troubled predictably
solemn clenched teeth voiced hero. But the lines he’s given
to squeeze out are low levels are hideously pubescent. You will
roll your eyes more than thrice if you are over the age of twelve.
This movie did nadda to help this poor schmuck's career. Poor
yellow bastard.
Samuel
L. Jackson has become, “Sam in a film.” Like Jack
Nicholson. No character cloaking, just “that cool guy”
in another film. I know this man can act…here he just yells
and snickers in a combo of his on-screen image mixed with one-dimensional
character study. There’s a ridiculous villain-loves-Nazis
scene that’s quotably funny. You don’t quite get its
point, but it looks cool and at this point you’re grasping
for something to redeem the frames.
The
film's gal pals strut about pouting properly in skin tight erotic
latex garbs. Scarlett Johansson, Octopus’ odd side kick.
just bugs me. So it’s not even fair for me to judge her
over the top moll droll. She does show she has a sense of humor
– however waif-ish. The other gals within are those inter-changeable
popular de jour sorts (yawn). And will thank me later for not
including their names here…The whole gang of stereotypes
run around Parkour style (thanks to CGI). In fact The Spirit
is made of CGI. It’s not nearly as neat as many of the other
works we’ve seen as of late though. And I use the word neat
in its clean and/or smooth definition. Hell, even the soundtrack
is annoying; enough with the generic creshendos already!
Admittedly,
there are smatterings of swell parts within the work. But their
swelling goes down rather quickly as the story plods
along. You can buy or rent it if you need to (read: big Miller
fan or feel like playing a drinking game where you take a shot
each time Sin City is ripped off, or you are simply into
comics-come-to-life). But if you’re on a budget make sure
you already own, or have rented, Sin City or 300
if you love Miller before forkin’ over the clams for this
shindig. He appears to have used his newly discovered Hollywood-power
for evil here. He literally redid Sin City without the
finess or eye Robert Rodriguez has. I could not even put the dvd
cover as it made my stomach a tad disgruntled (it's Sin City's
cover with a new name, different director, half the talent behind-the-scenes
and a lower-level cast basically).
.
Snack recommendation: Dinner in... after you
rented something else frankly.
Disc
One:
Film
Extras:
Green World Featurette
Miller on Miller
Alternative Storyboard Ending
Audio Commentary with Frank Miller
Trailer
Spanish Subtitles
Disc Two: Digital copy of the film
Buy
it
|
