A MELLOWER MILLER NOIR
Movie Review- The Spirit
Language: English
Directed by: Frank Miller
Comic book lover or not, its hard to ignore Frank Miller. After those forgettable Robocop assignments, he debuted as co-director with ‘Sin City’ and hit gold! His 300 consolidated his status even though the movie was a Zack Snyder effort! But taking up this Will Eisner comic (graphic novel) has really not been touted as a smart move by Miller!
For starters, the movie is NOT as graphic or sexually explicit as Sin City! You don’t get to see a lot of blood or naked chicks in this one as u can in his previous venture… but what left with the gore and the skin were a smooth plot, crisp dialogues and witty repartees. The Spirit is full of clichéd John Wayne lines that may be considered laughable at best! No doubt Samuel L. Jackson is impressive as Octopus, but ‘Spirit’, the character lacked the undead enigma of a ‘Batman’.
Even so, the success, however limited, of this movie has to be due to its faithfulness to its genre! The genre of putting a up a movie exactly as the comic storyboard has a certain appeal to the multitude of comic-book lovers who love to attend movie shows where they can enthusiastically compare the movie to the book frame by frame! Memorable scenes in that regard has to be Octopus’ den with Hitler’s still smirking at the viewers from a distance, and of course, the climax scene where The Spirit shows off his mythological knowhow with the hilarious quip, “Heracles? I always thought it was ‘Hercules’!”
It isn’t a movie so strong that it can take you by your ears and force you to immerse yourself in the makebelieve, realistic world so faithfully idolized by generations of comic-book lovers! Whether it lacked the Robert Rodriguez-ish edge of Sin City or whether Miller had simply a bad day in office is the question to be asked!
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