I
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certainly isn’t even close to being the most anticipated of the upcoming comic
book movie adaptations, but Frank Miller’s The Spirit will be one of the more
important ones when all is said and done, I think. Although flashier modern-day
titles from X-Men to Blade have made lots of dough and
spun off franchises, it’s proven much trickier to get audiences to care about early
20th-century heroes who can’t shoot laser blasts or fly. And let’s
face it…while campily enjoyable, films like The Phantom or The
Shadow weren’t the best made features, either. I think if The
Spirit just ends up being another unremarkable entry in that genre, it’s
not only going to do the comic a disservice, but also close the book on hero flicks
set in that era working at all. And that’d be a shame.
But
Miller’s flick plows ahead, and now it’s got a leading man. Well, there’s a guy
that’ll be filling out the suit at least. Miller’s chosen Gabriel Macht to take
the role of The Spirit, and I’m a little puzzled by the choice. I’ve seen this
guy in a number of films from The Recruit to American Outlaws, and
aside from continually playing second fiddle to Colin Farrell and being
handsome, there’s not much I’ve seen that would distinguish him from a kazillion
other blandly-appealing actors. He’s never bad, per se, but he’s also never distinctive.
But Miller’s says he aced the audition, and he’s got a great affinity for the
material and should know, so I’m willing to give him the benefit of the doubt.
I’m
actually much more interested to see how they’re going to deal with the one-tiny-step-away-from-Sambo
black sidekick The Spirit had. If he’s even in this film, there’s gotta be some
serious makeover work happening. Or maybe Sam Jackson can pull double-duty and
yell his way through that role and the baddie? It’s not like he’d turn an offer
down.