God help me I enjoyed Frank Miller's The Spirit

[Fifthfiend]

I really don't know what to think right now.

[Premmy]

I know what you should be feeling, abject dispair, shame, hatred, suicidal/homicidal urges.

[Masked Jedi]

Fifth, just do what I did.

Tell yourself that it's a terrible adaptation, that it's a huge disservice to Will Eisner, and that Frank Miller deserves to be punished for what he has done.

Then forget it's an adaptation (it's not like he gets anything right anyway).

Because if you pretend it's an original film, it's a masterpiece. Bask in the insane genius. I wholeheartedly recommend this film.

[Bells]

was it all the whores? Why did you like it?

[Masked Jedi]

Did you see it?

It was fucking insane. I saw it six months ago, and I still can't decide whether it's so bad it's good or legitimately good.

It's an experience. Just everything about it is beautiful and retarded at the same time. Like when the Spirit makes out with Sand Sarif for two minutes, in slow motion, as the camera swerves around them bullet-time style, and then they stop and he walks over to Ellen and says it's her he really loves! The whole movie is like that.

[Julford Hajime]

...You totally just sold me on the film.

I'm gonna go rentdownload a copy of it now.

[Azisien]

Originally Posted by Fifthfiend

I really don't know what to think right now.

Yeah I used to respect you and your avatars but now you're just "one of them."

Only funny part was the mud scene with the tiolets. Everything else was drivvel and if you ever come to your senses you'll realize that.

[Archbio]

I prefer, by far, to know it's terrible without actually having to watch the whole thing.

[Professor Smarmiarty]

It pays not to watch any movie that you think, based on its source and target audience, is going to be terrible. It'll only cause mental breakdowns in the long run when some of them are actually really good.

[Fifthfiend]

Originally Posted by Masked Jedi

Fifth, just do what I did.

Tell yourself that it's a terrible adaptation, that it's a huge disservice to Will Eisner, and that Frank Miller deserves to be punished for what he has done.

Then forget it's an adaptation (it's not like he gets anything right anyway).

Because if you pretend it's an original film, it's a masterpiece. Bask in the insane genius. I wholeheartedly recommend this film.

Originally Posted by Masked Jedi

Did you see it?

It was fucking insane. I saw it six months ago, and I still can't decide whether it's so bad it's good or legitimately good.

It's an experience. Just everything about it is beautiful and retarded at the same time. Like when the Spirit makes out with Sand Sarif for two minutes, in slow motion, as the camera swerves around them bullet-time style, and then they stop and he walks over to Ellen and says it's her he really loves! The whole movie is like that.

This and this are getting close to the level on which I enjoyed it although where MJ says

I still can't decide whether it's so bad it's good or legitimately good.

I would more say that I can't decide whether it's so bad it's god or SO so bad it's horrible that it's some entire new level of horribadly good. I think part of the charm is at no point does anybody involved pretend that this is anything other than awful schlocky crap or that they're in it for anything other than having an excuse to fuck around. I mean Scarlett Johansen even has a bit of what might as well be outright fourth-wall breaking when she's like "look man I'm just here for the fun of fucking around". The number-one killer of an otherwise good terrible movie is the movie suddenly for no good fucking reason trying to take itself seriously (ref: Smokin' Aces, Lucky Number Sleven) and I can honestly say that at no point whatsoever in this movie does that occur.*

While at the same time the thing never hits that late-phase "Goddamn Batman" Miller level of fuckingawful that I expected so the biggest problem you have is Spirit being a douche to his sorta-girlfriend which I mean let's be honest, is p. much standard superhero practice since time immemorial. I mean Superman did it, and nothing can really count as beyond the pale if Superman ever thought it was okay (barring inexplicable changes to electricity-based powers).

The whole thing just has this inexplicable doofy charm that extends to every single aspect of it. Like how every time the guy playing the Spirit tries to act he's just so haplessly bad at it that he can't reliably manifest anything that would register as annoying and I mostly just end up going awwwwww, wookit the little fella tryin' to be an actor! Go on buddy you can do it, just you keep on keepin' on! And then there's the way the whole thing drops plot points into place like a man tapping nails into his wall with a sledgehammer; the whole enterprise itself becomes a sort of weird form of meta-slapstick.

And god Samuel L Jackson in this movie is just so much the dumbest fucking thing ever put onto a moviescreen that I can't help but enjoy it. God him in this movie is like the level of terribad I hoped SoaP would be up until like eight seconds into it when I realized there was going to be some halfassed attempt made at making it an actual movie.

All in all it's the sort of thing where if I'd seen it in a theater I would have wanted my thirteen fucking dollars back but having seen it without having to pay actual money for it (TOTALLY LEGALLY) I can enjoy it on its own ridiculous level.


*Like the closest it gets is the doctor in love with the Spirit who stays at the hospital all hours of the night in case something happens to him. In case something happens to the Hero who regenerates competely from any and all physical harm. There is no point at which this movie forgets to remind you that it is in fact a totally ridiculous load of bullshit.