The Spirit (Gabriel Macht)
The Spirit is an adaptation of an acclaimed and influential 1940s comic strip by revered comic artist and writer Will Eisner. The Spirit (played in the film by Gabriel Macht from The Good Shepherd and A Love Song for Bobby Long) is a sharply dressed, masked crime fighter who is loved by the ladies and supported by the police. He has no superpowers but is mysteriously invincible, as is his arch nemesis The Octopus (Samuel L. Jackson). Frank Miller, a contemporary comic book legend, has written the screenplay and directed the film. Miller is responsible for the Batman comic story that influenced Tim Burton’s films Batman and Batman Returns, and he also created the comics Sin City and 300, both of which were very faithfully adapted for the big screen. Miller shared a director credit with Robert Rodriguez for the film version of Sin City so you would think that he was an ideal candidate for directing The Spirit film. But you would be wrong. Miller’s director credit for Sin City was very much an honorary title and he clearly didn’t learn much from watching Rodriguez work because The Spirit is an extremely amateurish effort.
Posted by Thomas Caldwell 
