Where to go if THE SPIRIT piqued your interest in the original comics

Typically when I review a movie based on a comic book I take along my friend Berko who spends more time than any thirty year old would care to admit reading comics. Aside from also being another movie buff, Berko fills me in on the original source material and whatnot. After watching THE SPIRIT we both agreed it was a pretty piss-poor movie - too much of a pastiche to be genuinely engaging, and with a visual style that merely replicated SIN CITY. Still, I thought the whole idea of the story and the characters was pretty intriguing and was interested to know how far Will Eisner's original comics differed from this adaptation. Now, in the case of THE SPIRIT Berko's knowledge was pretty sketchy but he did point me in the direction of a really great comic book podcast called AROUND COMICS. What I love about it is that it's a bunch of guys who really know and love comics and obviously have a lot of knowledge BUT are also keen not to intimidate new fans. In fact, they've helpfully set up a forum where newbies like me can ask seemingly obvious questions. In answer to my question of where people whose interest in THE SPIRIT had been piqued by the movie could go, I got the following answer, and I figured other people might be interested too....

THE SPIRIT - disastrous noir spoof from Frank Miller

"The only thought in my mind was, 'It's too big — I can't possibly do it.' And I refused. And about three minutes later as I was at the doorway, I turned around and said, 'Nobody else can touch this,' and I agreed to the job on the spot".

Frank Miller should have trusted his instincts and passed up the opportunity to go solo and direct the feature length adaptation of Will Eisner's seminal 1940s weekly serial. 

The strip was a noir thriller about a rookie cop brought back from the dead, living under his grave stone, investigating crime in Central City. Miller gives the book the same treatment as SIN CITY - using digital backgrounds penned largely in gray scale with occasional flashes of iridescent red - and the film is extremely stylish as a result. Miller also does the decent thing in consigning The Spirit's politically incorrect sidekick "Ebony White.

Every other directorial choice Frank Miller makes is wrong. First, let's talk casting. Gabriel Macht lacks charisma as The Spirit. All the other actors turn in hammy, self-referential performances that are painful to watch. It's not entirely their fault. Miller has directed this movie as a pastiche. The movie literally takes the piss out of itself like some dumb SCARY MOVIE flick. The result is a complete waste of time: alienating, unfunny, plain embarrassing.  I just feel that Samuel L Jackson in particular needs to be really careful about taking these sorts of role - after SNAKES ON A PLANE and his increasingly mannered performances he's in danger of turning into a self-parody.  Jackson plays The Octopus.  Uh-huh.  Not only do we see The Octopus' face but we get to see him dress up as a Samurai, and as a Nazi, for no reason than because Miller wanted a bit of sport.  I mean, seriously, how crass can you get?

Avoid at all costs. 

THE SPIRIT is on release in Indonesia, Italy, Portugal, Singapore, Spain, the USA, Australia, Taiwan, France, Iceland, the UK, Denmark and Israel. It opens next week in Israel, New Zealand and Poland. It opens on January 15th in Russia, Brazil and on January 22nd in Argentina, Finland, Iceland and Norway. It opens on January 29th in Germany, on February 19th in the Czech Republic, on February 25th in Belgium and the Netherlands. 

300 - truly a spectacle

300 is truly a spectacle. It dazzles the viewer with stunning images of finely-hewed, red-caped Spartan warriors; decadent Persian courtiers; a gold-flecked, jewel-bedecked god-king; and enough stylised spear-fights to satisfy the most ardent Total Warrior.

The movie is based on Frank Miller's graphic novel which told the story of the Battle of Thermopylae. Thermopylae is a narrow pass in Greece, and in 480 BC King Leonidas of Sparta defended that pass with a small army of his own Spartans and other Greeks against a vastly larger Persian invading force.

Writer-director Zach Snyder beautifully renders Frank Miller's graphic novel: feeding our imaginations with the sort of old-fashioned glamour, excess and epic sentiment that old-fashioned big-studio Hollywood used to specialise in. The director uses the same techniques as in SIN CITY - mixing live-action with CGI to create highly stylised visuals that approximate the graphic novel. Famous plates are re-created closely - specifically Leonidas pushing the Persian ambassador into the well; the Spartans herding the Persians off a cliff; and the final spear throw that grazes Xerxes face. The casting closely matches the facial features of the characters in the graphic novel too - especially the case of the effete Xerxes and Leonidas himself.

The plot is also fairly close to the novel, with no key scenes ommitted. The key difference is that the role of Queen Gorgo is massively enhanced, perhaps as a sop to Hollywood's need for a strong female character and a love-interest. (They did the same thing with the role of Arwen in LOTR). Thus, the film breaks away from the battle-scenes to Gorgo's struggle to get the Spartan council to send the full army in support of Leonidas.

So much for what 300 is. What 300 is not, is a history lesson. It is not a political tract. Nor should we beat it up for failing to give us an exact rendering of the key battles and fighting styles or for simplifying the clash between Persia and Greece as one of freedom versus tyranny. (Although, in its defence, Dominic West's Spartan politican rightly points out to Lena Headey's Queen Gorgo that not all men are born equal, even in Sparta.)

300 does not pretend to be a serious politico-historical discourse. It is, simply-put, epic, fascinating, sensually-luxurious entertainment. The concubines, giant-mutant beasties, scabrous priests and other exotica pander to our most basic desire for the strange and exciting. I defy anyone not to take pleasure in the finale to Gorgo's council speech or Gerard Butler's Connery-like drawl as he refuses to kneel to Xerxes on account of his "cramp".

Moreover, exotica aside, the battle scenes do give us a sense of the scale of the battle and the key tactical necessity of forcing the Persians to abandon an open assault from the beach and attempt to pass through the narrow gorge at Thermopylae. I doubt whether Frank Miller's novel or this film would have been successful as they are without this key central fact: dress it up how you will, the true story of a small band of men defending their home against a mammoth invading army and inflicting disproportionately large injuries upon it is, in a word, quite literally: awesome.

300 is on release in the Philippines, Greece, Malaysia, Singapore, Canada, the US, South Korea, Hong Kong, Iceland, India, Indonesia, Turkey, the UK, Belgium, France, the Czech Republic, Hungary, the Netherlands and Russia. It opens in Bulgaria, Estonia, Italy, Mexico, Norway, Poland, Romania and Spain tomorrow. It opens in Argentina, Chile, Peru, Slovakia, Slovenia on the 29th and in Brazil, Denmark, Latvia and Venezuala on the 30th. 300 opens in Sweden on April 4th and in Australia, Germany, Israel and Portugal on April 5th. It opens in Austria and Finland on April 6th and in Japan on June 9th.