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LOL: One Critic Calls The Spirit One of The Best Movies of The Year

Posted on Sunday, December 21st, 2008 by Peter Sciretta

/Film reader Koorck sends over the below new television advertisement for Frank Miller’s The Spirit, which includes a quote calling it “one of the best films of the year!” But wait? The early reviews pegged Frank Miller’s comic book movie adaptation as somewhere between the worst movie of all time, or one of the worst films of the year. Even the slightly positive reviews say things like ” entertaining, if forgettable” and “the film has no story to speak of and the tone is all over the place”.

What respectable film critic would make the claim that the movie is one of 2008’s best? Earl Dittman? Nope… Our over enthusiastic friend over at FirstShowing.net — Alex Billington? Nope, we have confirmed that he hasn’t even been shown the film yet. The small type at the bottom of the screen reads: Scott Hoffman MoviePictureFilm.com. Really interested to find out why Hoffman believes the film is so incredible, I’ve tried searching the MoviePictureFilm website for his review, but came up empty handed. I did however find his review from last year calling Southland Tales “one of the best movies of 2007″.

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  • filmkid
    tryin to trick people to see this movie i knew it will get bad reviews when i saw the stupid fight with Samuel L. Jackson vs Gabriel Macht it looked really silly that put me off from watchin it
  • I'm going to reserve my full judgement (good/bad/hot/cold) until I see this film when it's released in Britain, but something that did catch my attention, was at the end of the TV spot I heard "Coming soon, rated 12-A." Hmm, 12A/PG-13...so it's just going to be pretty green-screen acting and CGI cobbled together with no blood or guts? What was/is Frank Miller thinking?!?!?
  • Peter, it seems like you're being kinda hard on a fellow movie critic. Sure, The Spirit may suck to most, but is that really enough reason to make a full post calling out someone for their opinion? It seems kinda overly-negative, and pretty poor form, if you ask me...
  • GOOFRIP
    It should be a great film. I just hope that by the end it really is a good film!
  • Bull
    What? This movie sucks.
  • Bill
    it will be good, everyone else can shove it.
  • Oh WTF?! Why you picking on me? Wait... I do love a lot of movies... But no, I haven't seen The Spirit yet, sorry! ;)
  • Well when you do, you're gonna have to give it a negative review now or else it's going to seem kinda...well, like Peter Sciretta has a point.
  • joshi38
    And lord knows, we wouldn't want that.
  • Haha we all eagerly await your review Alex :)
  • Oh come on Billington... I thought it was you too when I first saw the commercial. Had to hit that quick rewind button on my TIVO to find out that it was this other guy.

    Though, in all fairness, I don't even think that you could like The Spirit. You've got more self-respect than that.
  • So it's about self-respect eh? Or is it about actual enjoyment? But nah, I expect to hate it as much as everyone else! Contrary to popular belief, I'm actually not as low down and dirty as this MoviePictureFilm.com guy. :)
  • That's what I mean -- you have more self-respect than to just throw up a quote like that on such a terrible movie. This MoviePictureFilm.com guy is on a whole different level... Doesn't appear to be about enjoyment for him, either...
  • sarcastic, much? lol.
  • Wade Wilson
    I call shenanigans on this review..
  • Say shenanigans one more time..........
  • Joe
    Hey Farva, what's that place you like with all the goofy shit on the walls?
  • You mean Shananigans?
  • I'm gonna have to call shenanigans on this article I don't recall them ever saying it was a movie critic that called it "one of the best films of the year". Perhaps it was a food critic or a music critic or maybe even the character of "The Critic" from the short lived animated sitcom.
  • Kyle
    Classy Peter, laughing at someone else's taste in movies. I thought film was suppose to be subjective.

    guess it's not at /film.
  • I'm pretty sure Slashfilm is Pete's own blog about all sorts of things. If you don't like reading his thoughts you shouldn't even bother coming here.

    It's cool to have your own thoughts and opinions but judging from the majority of critics this movie is going to bomb. Plus it sounds like this critic is made up in the first place, he did like Southland Tales and all. Or I guess there could be one critic in the entire world that likes crappy movies.
  • Kyle. We posted a review roundup featuring various critic opinions about the movie. We care about other peoples movie tastes, but calling this movie the best of the year is outrageous. If someone did the same with Disaster Movie, we would also spotlight it.
  • Kyle
    and I would leave the same comment if you did. Do you really think this kind of thing is post worthy? I know it's slow news weeks, but c'mon.

    I thought this site was better than this kind of thing.
  • Everyone I know on twitter has been talking about the ridiculous quote, which shows me there is an interest.
  • Wilt Chamberlain
    Kyle is the "moral conscience" of slashfilm. Our just some angry nerd that wants this movie to be really good.
  • hey pete, have you seen the movie?
  • Bull
    Hello - it sucks. Now go away.
  • Thats Bull.
  • Can we stop throwing around this "film is objective" bullshit? because it really isnt. Sure, there are elements of subjectivity when watching a film, but logically there are obvious good films and obvious bad films and they are seen that way for a number of proven reasons. That phrase is simply an excuse for people who can't discuss film intelligently.
  • Amen!
  • the review isn't even posted on that movie site...it's a ploy from the studio to trick fans of Sin City and 300 to see this...Frank Miller should be ashamed to have his named attached to this
  • Gripster
    His name isn't "attached" to it, its existence is 100% his fault. If anything, Will Eisner should be ashamed to have his name attached to this, but he's too busy rolling in his grave.
  • After looking at his site this gives me hope as I start up a new blog, I may be able to get into a TV advert, wow haha. This movie looks horrible though.
  • Palmer
    Okay, I'm going to say that it's a studio plant. I think Paramount or Columbia did something like that a few years ago.
  • Also... who the fuck is Scott Hoffman?
  • He has eight of everything!
  • Japa
    This movie seems similar to Sin City in art department so i doubt I'll like it, but if and after I see it, I'll be able to judge/comment it. Now this is going to surprise all the film critics out there, but I don't always agree with them and don't pick movies based entirely on their reviews.
  • I agree, I might watch this too, but it's not going to be because of what any critic has said about it. I like to read reviews over movies and what not but if i get a chance to watch it I probably will.
  • C.K.
    High cpu usage in my PC caused playback to freeze at the 0:26 mark. The frame it stopped at shows a very high resemblance to the disintegration of the Watchmen's Dr. Osterman character into Dr. Manhattan as shown in that film's trailer. Did anyone else notice this?
  • Totally!!!! WTF? I was wondering if anyone else noticed that. I dug out my Watchmen graphic novel and found the pic...then re-watched the trailer. Wow.
  • ut713
  • Thanks. by the way I want to make it clear that I meant "can we stop throwing around this "film is SUBJECTIVE" bullshit"
  • now i see how the dark knight is so praised. all of you don't have an opinion of your own. you don't see movies with open eyes. you go in with a set opinion of it and make watching the movie a pointless experience. like cattle, you let yourselves be herded around by reviewers. "so and so said it's good or bad so it must be" ...tisk, tisk. have your own opinions for once. I'm not saying this movie will be good or bad, i just hate seeing people judge something they haven't seen for themselves yet.
  • Barry Manilow
    How do you know who and who hasn't seen movies for themselves? Why did you bring The Dark Knight into this posting? Why is that all you talk about? Why can't you capitalize your sentences so people don't laugh away your opinions? Why are you such a loser?

    All questions we will never have questions to.
  • 1. The movie hasn't been released yet.

    2. I brought up the Dark Knight because it's another case of creating a set opinion of something before one even seen it.

    3. I talk about it as much or maybe even less than the amount that movie is talked about in general.

    4. what the hell does that question even mean?

    5. because I think for myself.

    All questions (except the nonsensical one) have been answered.
  • 1. The movie hasn't been released yet.

    2. I brought up the Dark Knight because it's another case of creating a set opinion of something before one even seen it.

    3. I talk about it as much, or maybe even less, than the amount that movie is talked about in general.

    4. what the hell does that question even mean?

    5. because I think for myself.

    All questions (except the nonsensical one) have been answered.
  • Peter Chen lol'd.
  • yes!
  • "Not your average superhero film- but something much, much more special and unique, "The Spirit" is one of the best films of the year. It's not another "The Dark Knight", it's not trying to be. Go in expecting a fun, uncommonly stimulating action movie full of, you guessed it, spirit- and in turn it will blow you away. "

    The review is now up. That is the actual language he used to describe the film. Still funny.
  • 790
    Boy that's great news VegaBro cause I feel the same way when ppl claim Wall•E is the best picture of the year.
    Subjective , yeah right!' Your opening up a can of,"oh shit" Peter.

    Movie subjectivity is a two way street...
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