The Spirit

"The Spirit is Willing, but the Film is Weak..."

"The Spirit" is one of those "pure" super-hero concepts from the '40's, like Superman and Batman. Created by Will Eisner in 1940, "The Spirit" combined film-noir with masked vigilantes and "Terry and the Pirates" femme-fatales. His origins were always a little murky, but "The Spirit" was the born-again/ reincarnated/ revived corpse of policeman Denny Colt, "killed" in the line of duty. He wore a blue business suit, hat and gloves, a red tie, and (to appease editors' requests for a "super-hero") a mask.

He had no special powers other than being good in a brawl and irresistable to women. Eisner's artwork and story-telling sensibilities were innovative and is credited with being one of the great creators of comics "language" in much the same way that D. W. Griffith established film language.

One of Eisner's "disciples" and students is Frank Miller, whose ground-breaking work on Marvel's "Daredevil," and DC's "Batman" made him a super-star in the field of comics. Miller began his own series of ultra-violent neo-noir black-and-white comics under the banner "Sin City." The stories could have been a bare-bones story-board for a film, and Robert Rodriguez (with Miller as co-director) made a well-received film of a clutch of the Miller stories for his "Sin City" film.*

Given Miller's status as co-director (and his obvious influence in the design of the film) it was only a matter of time before he was given his own directing job, and naturally, in this super-hero season of the movies, it was going to be "The Spirit" as the subject of his debut.

Will Eisner must be trying to emerge from the grave Denny Colt-style to strangle him.

For instead of Eisner's creation, Miller has made a Frankenstein monster of a film that tries to update "The Spirit," making him an indestructible fighting machine with mysterious revivification powers, and the ability to run across telephone wires. In additon the film is...stacked with an assortment of prominent female stars in subsidiary roles—Eva Mendes as villainess Sand Saref, Scarlett Johansson(terrible!) as Silken Floss, assistant to "The Octopus" (we're saving him for last), Paz Vega as Plaster (of Paris), Sarah Paulson ("Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip") as Ellen Dolan, daughter of the police commisioner; all of these fine actors are capable of doing better work, but you'd never know from the lack-luster performances and awkward timing of the scenes. It's all meant to be sexy, hip and edgy, but rather than re-create Eisner's light-hearted mix of comic and noir, it falls back on the same "camp" qualities evident in the third and worst season of the "Batman" television series, as well as Joel Schumacher's troubling "Batman" films.

Frequently you'll watch a scene with awkward staging, bad timing, knowing full-well it was done in front of a "green-screen" to put in some background that, if they'd thought about it, might have helped the lumbering quality of the foreground actors. Either Miller didn't know how to make it work, or just assumed that it would work, given his expertise with the material. After working in two dimensions for so long, three seems to be beyong him. As it is, it feels like lazy directing--kinf of like Miller's last "Dark Knight" comic where he drew in the foreground figures and let his colorist wife, Lynn Varley, provide the backgrounds. The results look just as cheap and unprofessional in both mediums.

Now, let's save the worst for last: Most egregious of all the performances is Samuel L. Jackson as "The Spirit's" nemesis "The Octopus." Limited to shots of his gloves in the comics, Jackson is all out-front and comic-satirical in this which doesn't work, although he does manage to mine some laughs out of his material. "The Octopus" is saddled with goons, evidently cloned from Curly of "The Three Stooges." They're all morons, but disposable at a moment's notice. At one point, "Sprit" and "Octopus" engage in a mud-pit death-match that has all the sensibilities (and realism) of a "Tom and Jerry" cartoon—at one point "Spirit" is hit over the head with a lead pipe that comes away with a head-shaped U-indentation. Unfortunately, that's what passes for humor in this train-wreck. In fact, a train-wreck would probably pass for humor in it, too.

All in all, for all its creative advancements in "getting it all up there," the "green screen" type of film environment has managed to confound some accomplished film-makers (ie. George Lucas, Robert Rodriguez, hell, even Kerry Conran is more accomplished!) creating impressive computer wall-papers but leeching the drama right out of their movies. Instead of taking movies forward, they've taken them backwards in terms of performance and film-language. If those guys couldn't overcome the awkwardness of the rootless film with no sets, what made Miller think he could? One suspects its the same flaw that plagues so many of the cartoonist's creations: hubris.

"The Spirit" is a Waste of Time. "My Wallet Screams."

One of Will Eisner's block-titled "splash" pages: Now that's "The Spirit"

* Well-received by everybody but me. I thought the literal translation of "Sin City" the comic to "Sin City" the movie showed just how much different information specificity permeates both mediums. And never the twain shall meet. "Sin City" (the movie) didn't work because once you fill in the 23 frames of action that Miller didn't provide in his drawings, the super-human heroics of ordinary people takes on ludicrous overtones. And, conversely, "Sin City" (the movie) exposed just how weak, snuff-pornish, and lunk-headed Miller's original material ("Sin City" the comic) was in the first place. There are some things the "strobed highlights" of comics and graphic novels do very well, that don't work in the movies (and vice versa). Movies based on comics have to be able to translate the four-color flash-cards that comics represent from static two dimensions to moving three-dimensions--which is why "the Dark Knight" for all its plot-holes, conceits and cheats manages to be a good "real-world" representation of the freak-show aspects of Gotham City.

300

"This won't be over quickly. You will not enjoy this"

Two characters say this in "300," but it might as well have been me when I walked into the theater. I'm not a fan of Frank Miller, the comic-book artist-turned-writer who breathed new life into Marvel's "Daredevil" and DC's "Batman." I enjoyed his work on those, but around the time of his "Sin City" output, I began to think of his work as campily overblown and corrupt. When he ran out of ideas, he'd have one of his characters cut off a limb and do something that defied the laws of physics and that would serve as plot advancement. So, upon seeing the extremely faithful adaptation of "Sin City" years ago, I just hung my head and thought that was the end of Miller doing anything good ever again. His hack-work was too successful. A second Batman "Dark Knight" series was a sporadically illustrated mess, and his current work on an "All-Star" version of the character has been embarrassing. His scripts for the "Robocop" series were terrible. His co-directorial debut with "Sin City" was a frame by frame recreation of his original illustrations, and in those, there was power, no matter how thick-headed the concept or eye-rolling the dialogue that accompanied them. It did point out, however, why films are one thing and graphic story-telling is another. Comics have the luxury of leaping from high-point to high-point. They suspend time to make way for mouthfuls of dialogue. They focus the eye and mind. Film does this, too, but at 24 frames a second, rather than the one comics afford. A film has to crash through that white border separating panels, and that's the difference between art and artifice.

Now, Miller's "300" has hit the screen, and unlike "Sin City," director Zack Snyder has taken the concept, the tone, and Miller's design sense but gone his own way with the direction. Key frames of Miller's book are reproduced, but for the most part Snyder has found a way of taking Miller's trope and making it move and breathing life into it. And it's Snyder's efforts to connect the dots and make Miller's flat-panels three dimensional that lets "300" rise above most comic book adapatations. It's still overblown. Some of the dialogue is not only bad, it's bad for today, much less ancient Greece (When King Leonidas meets his opposing King, the bling-encrusted Xerxes--who's not nearly as gay as Miller made him in the book--he takes a look at the Persian's elaborate transportation and says "Let me guess. You must be Xerxes"--a line more weisenheimer than kingly. But it beats the fade-out line on the eve of the final battle: "Unless I miss my guess, we're in for one wild night!" Oy. So bad it stings!), it's a bit too enamored by the CGI-technology to create blood-spurts, but damn, if it doesn't move and hold your interest! There's one shot--of King Leonidas providing point (literally) to an attack done in one long take, and as he dispatches opponent after opponent, at each impact the film is speed-ramped to a crawl, which is as ingenious a way of recreating the framing ability of comics in a moving picture as has been devised. Sort of like Peckinpah's slo-mo cut-aways but self-contained in a single shot.

So, what did I think of it? I enjoyed it! I may not like Miller's current writing, but one can't fault his illustrative sense, and Snyder brings it to glorious life. It may be gratuitous "homo-erotic war pornography," but it's sure well-constructed homo-erotic war pornography. It makes one anticipate Snyder's promised version of Alan Moore's "Watchmen," although one quails at the suggestion (and it's only been suggested) of Tom Cruise at Ozymandius. Not even a Spartan could face that!
"300" is a rip-snorting, shield-pounding, popcorn-throwing, CGI-scenery-chewing matinee.